Lots of home automation gadgets can be oversold as life changing. My biggest bug bearer is how often smart bulbs add steps to your home processes instead of taking them away. Home automation needs to be a bit more considered. Which is exactly why I love Aqara’s smart curtain controller. With a little bit of scheduling, this has become an important part of my daily routine.
How to Make Curtains Smart
Converting your curtains into smart curtains isn’t difficult. It’s also not overly cheap, so try to take advantage of Amazon’s big sale days when buying Aqara products.
The Aqara Curtain Driver E1 is a simple device that sits into your curtain rail or rod (different products for each) and opens and closes your curtains based on commands, schedules or automations. You simply pin your curtains up with the clips either side of the curtain driver. This then rolls back and forth dragging the curtain with it.
One important note is that you will need Aqara’s controller for this if you don’t already have one.
One tricky part here is that most window setups have two curtains, one opening center out to left and one going center out to right. This means you need to buy two, not one, of Aqara’s drivers. This makes an already considered purchase, a little more considered.
My Personal Experience with the Aqara Curtain Driver E1
My situation was simple. My bedroom is upstairs in a mezzanine style layout. There’s not incredible light coming in or visibility from the outside in. But still, to head upstairs and open the curtains was a bit of a chore.
Aqara’s Curtain Driver E1 lets me automate the opening and closing of my track curtains in the bedroom. This has had two distinct advantages for me.
First it meant I could now close the curtains upstairs without going up there. It’s lazy, I know. But still, it’s nice to know the bright room isn’t visible from the outside. I nearly got caught a few times out of the shower!
The much bigger benefit is the morning automation. I have played around with the blinds being setup in two different ways. My favorite is the automatic opening at 9am. It means if I’m tempted to have a lie in and snooze my alarm, I have one final barrier to a sleep in. The bright light coming in automatically.
The other is aligning the opening of the curtains to natural daylight to improve my circadian rhythm exposure. I didn’t like this as much given the motors aren’t exactly quiet. It’s more effective to use them as a “wake up” moment than discreet action.
Perhaps what impressed me most with the Aqara curtain drivers is the battery life. I’ve had these installed for a year now, opening or closing at least twice a day. I’ve had to charge them once. Which is wild to me.
The Verdict: Aqara Curtain Driver E1
Excellent. Absolutely love it. Little loud. A little pricey, retailing for €100 per unit right now. But one of those pieces of tech where even my other half says “I’d miss not having that automated”. Honestly, that’s the biggest verdict that should sway you towards buying this.
Unfortunately, it’s not the cheapest solution which is a bit of a nuisance if you have lots of curtained windows. But you could just buy these for the room you open and close the most. But then if you’re like me, you’ll love the idea of just opening and closing all curtains on a schedule.
Aqara’s main outlet is either direct from them or on Amazon. So the flip side here is that you’ll often pick these up on a discount. For example, in the upcoming Prime Big Deals Days you can get these on Amazon UK and Amazon Germany with a 30% discount.
