The $29.95 Philips Hue White Ambiance is a Wi-Fi-enabled smart light bulb capable of shifting color temperatures within the white spectrum. Like other Hue bulbs, you can control the Ambiance from your phone or tablet, or link it up with Amazon’s Alexa, Apple’s Siri, If This Then That (IFTTT), and a number of other products and services. But aside from the ability to change color temperature, you aren’t getting anything here that you can’t get for half the price with the Hue White, our Editors’ Choice. If you’re already part of the Philips Hue ecosystem and want to get just the right mood lighting, the Ambiance might be worth it. But if you’re new to connected lighting, you’re better off starting with the Hue White.
Design and Features
Equipped with an E26 screw base that should fit in most lamps and fixtures, the Ambiance measures 4.3 inches tall and 2.4 inches across the widest point. Like the Hue White, it’s made of smooth matte plastic at the bottom, and shinier opaque plastic at the top. The Ambiance flattens out at the top while the Hue White remains round.
The Ambiance outputs brightness at 400 to 800 lumens depending on your chosen color temperature, which can go from 2,200K (warm white) to 6,500K (cool white). That’s roughly the same range as the bulbs in the C by GE Starter Pack, which go from 2,000K to 7,000K. The 800-lumen Hue White, meanwhile, can only radiate white light fixed at a color temperature of 2,700K.
Like the Hue White, the Ambiance only produces white light. If you want a color-changing bulb you’ll have to spend a bit more for the LIFX Color 1000 or Philips’ own Hue Connected Bulb. Like most Hue bulbs, the Ambiance is estimated to last nearly 23 years based on three hours of use per day, or about 25,000 hours total.
To control the bulb with your phone or voice, you need a compatible hub like the Philips Hue Bridge 2.0 or the Wink. You can get two Ambiance bulbs in a bundle with the Hue Bridge 2.0 and a Philips Hue Wireless Dimming Kit for $129.95. Bluetooth-only bulbs like the TikTeck Smart LED don’t require hubs, but you’re limited to control only when you’re in Bluetooth range, so you can’t adjust them while away from home.
Setup, App, and Performance
Setting up the Ambiance is fairly easy. If you have a Hue Bridge, you simply need to download the Philips Hue app on your Android or iOS device, screw the bulb into a socket, and follow the on-screen instructions. I connected the bulb to an Apple iPhone 6 in about a minute.
The app is the same one you use with all Hue connected light products. It recently received an update that makes it easier to arrange bulbs, name rooms, and control entire groups of lights at the same time. Each room has a toggle switch next to it so you can turn all the lights on or off at once. Or, you can tap the room name, see a list of every bulb in there, and individually control each one.
Like other Philips Hue lights, you can select Scenes, which are basically preset lighting scenarios like Relax (which produces a pleasant, warm light) and Concentrate (which is more of an office-like cool light). You can also establish Routines, which are essentially schedules and timers (for example, you can set a light to turn on automatically at the time you usually wake up). Furthermore, you can log into your Hue account in order to control your lights while you’re out of the house.
You can also connect the bulb with IFTTT, which lets you create recipes that cause it to react to triggers, like social media notifications, or traffic and weather changes. Apple users can tell Siri to turn the lights on or off or set them to specific scenes, but you can’t get detailed when it comes to color temperatures. Additionally, if you have an Amazon Echo or other Alexa-equipped device, you can download a third-party widget and use the voice assistant to control your lights in much the same way.
As the name suggests, the Ambiance bulbs are meant for settings like bedrooms, dining rooms, or anywhere else you want to add a bit of atmosphere. When set to a cooler temperature, the bulbs emit a bright, blueish light, which is good for working. Dial it to a warmer temperature, and the bulbs will radiate a warmer, more soothing light, like a candle. I found the Ambiance pleasant when installed in my bedside lamp; the warmer light was perfect for bedtime. But the bulbs are less bright than the Philips Hue White, even though both are technically capable of 800 lumens. And while you can’t illuminate an entire room with the Hue White, you really only get the equivalent of candlelight with the Ambiance. It’s also worth mentioning that the bulb ran hotter than the Hue White in testing.
Conclusions
The Philips Hue White Ambiance is a worthwhile consideration if you’re already part of the Philips Hue family, and you want to add mood lighting to your house. But if you want more affordable and brighter light for every room in your home, the Philip Hue White is a better option at half the price, and our Editors’ Choice. If you want a color-changing bulb, the LIFX Color 1000 is your brightest bet, though the original Hue bulbs offer the same expansive set of features as the Ambiance. And if you just want to give smart lighting a try, the Bluetooth-only, color-changing TikTeck Smart LED bulb is a good, inexpensive way to see if you like it.
