SwitchBot Smart Candle Warmer Lamp Review

SwitchBot Smart Candle Warmer Lamp: Introduction

While admittedly a bit of a gimmick, SwitchBot’s candle warmer lamp takes a familiar, slightly older idea and brings it firmly into the smart home era.

Rather than burning a candle over an open flame, the wax is slowly heated from above through a halogen bulb, releasing scent without smoke, soot, or fire hazards.

This is said to be the world’s first candle warmer to support Matter-over-Wi-Fi, and we don’t need to double-check that.

What this means is that it can be plugged directly into almost any smart home platform without the need for a dedicated hub.

At under $40, it’s clearly positioned as a fun and accessible smart home accessory, but once you spend some time with it, you quickly realize that this isn’t just a novelty for novelty’s sake.

Read our full review of the SwitchBot Candle Warmer Lamp.

Design and setup

For something as niche as this, SwitchBot does a surprisingly solid job with the design.

This lamp has a clean, modern look with a tube-style base and arm, topped with a hood that hangs over the candle. The height is approximately 30cm, and the bulb is approximately 20cm above the candle position.

It has enough space to hold most standard jar candles without being too bulky.

Available in black and white, both blend easily into your side table or shelf.

Inside the box, you’ll find the candle warmer lamp itself, a wired smart controller built into the cable, and a pair of GU10 50W halogen bulbs.

Its controller is a small pebble-shaped plastic unit located about 20 cm down the cable from the lamp.

There are three chunky buttons: power, brightness up, and a timer button to toggle preset options. Connect another 1.5 meters of cable from there to the wall plug.

When set up via the SwitchBot app, it exits the normal SwitchBot Bluetooth pairing mode, then gives it a name, assigns it to a room, and connects only to your home Wi-Fi network (2.4 GHz).

The QR code is printed on the back of the controller…

Compatible with smart home

Matter-over-Wi-Fi, so SwitchBot Hub is not required for cross-platform support.

Good news for those new to the SwitchBot ecosystem, as it pairs directly with the Matter controller you already own.

We usually recommend adding your device to the manufacturer’s app first to unlock additional features. It’s of little importance here.

The SwitchBot app allows dimming from 1 to 100%, timer up to 23 hours and 50 minutes (in 10 minute increments), fade-in and fade-out times from 5 seconds to 60 minutes, and one-time or recurring schedules.

But either way, you can replicate almost all of it within your smart home platform of choice.

In use and energy usage

Functionally, the carefully molded hood houses a 50W halogen bulb that transfers heat directly to the candle.

That’s it…but it works.

When I turned the brightness to 100%, the candle started melting within about 5 minutes.

Once the wax was properly melted, I was able to reduce the brightness to about 60% and keep it there to maintain a steady pool of melted wax and consistent scent emission.

Since brightness directly controls heat output, you’re effectively adjusting scent intensity using the dimmer slider, which is oddly satisfying.

Compatible with candles up to 9.5cm in diameter and 14cm in height, covering most standard jar candles.

I tested both soy-based essential oil candles and traditional beeswax, and both worked as expected.

However, it will be hot. There’s a reason there’s a warning sticker on the hood. You don’t want to put your hand under it for more than a second or two.

It makes weird sense if you love candles, enjoy scents without burning them, and enjoy smart home gadgets that are a little silly.

energy consumption

It doesn’t cost much to use this halogen bulb for a long time. When the bulb was 100% on, it consumed an average of 0.052kWh of electricity every hour.

Based on recent average energy prices, keeping a light bulb on for an hour costs just about 1.4p in the UK and less than 1p in the US.

If you leave the bulb on for an extended period of time at night, say for a 5-hour session, your total energy consumption will be 0.26kWh, and the total cost will be just about 6.9p in the UK and 4.7c in the US.

This is still 10 times the price of the LED GU10, but the LED GU10 doesn’t produce enough heat to melt candle wax.

We know what you’re thinking… Both the UK and the US have all but banned the sale of most inefficient lighting, including halogen bulbs, as part of major national initiatives to improve energy efficiency.

However, these bans primarily focus on light bulbs used for general lighting, with exceptions for special uses where heat is a function. In other words, it is not halogen heating, but halogen lighting that is prohibited.

I chucked an LED GU10 in there to see if it has no warming effect and can be used as a smart lamp without dice. It flashed like crazy.

SwitchBot states that “You can purchase halogen bulbs with specification GU10 50W for candle warmer lamps,” so you don’t have to worry if the two bulbs in the box stop working.

final thoughts

Really…it’s just a cheap smart light. But it’s also pretty stupid, since it’s not very useful.

But candle warmers are certainly useful, so why not use them? Especially if you’re already using SwitchBot, or if you have a smart ecosystem in other ecosystems (well, all of them) that work with Matter?

Sure, you could attach a smart plug to a non-smart candle warmer, but where’s the fun in that? And you can’t really control the heat.

Incorporating all the usual smart home control methods to provide scent and fragrance without flames or smoke is actually very effective.

Test method

When we publish a review, you can rest assured that it is the result of long-term testing.

Smart lights typically exist within an ecosystem, or perhaps a set of products that all work in harmony. Therefore, it is impossible to use connected lights for a week and make a judgment.

We test smart home kits all day, every day, so we know what’s important and how a particular light compares to the alternatives you’re considering.

Our reviews are comprehensive, objective and unbiased, and of course we don’t receive direct compensation to review devices.

For more information, read our guide on how to test smart lights.