The Whirlpool Smart Kitchen extends to wearables and voice

Today at CES in Las Vegas, Whirlpool have gone a step further with their appliances making them smarter and more integrated into our lives. When you consider the humble fridge, oven, microwave and dishwasher it is hard to imagine how they could be “smart” beyond knowing how to heat our food.

Integration with Google Assistant, Amazon Alexa and even the Apple Watch has been added. What this means is that firstly, your appliances are now connected to the home Wi-Fi network, yep, the microwave connects to the internet. Welcome to 2018.

Firstly, the appliances are app connected, download it to your smartphone and you’ll be able to control your appliances. But the best use of the app is when you’re planning on cooking something from a box, eg a pizza that needs to go in the oven. From Woolies or Coles, scan the barcode and at home your oven could start pre-heating, get home, whack the pizza into the oven and it will know how long to cook the pizza for, then notify your smartphone when it is ready. Simple.

Secondly, you could be asking your Google Home or an Amazon Echo how much time is left on that item in the microwave or setting the oven temperature and starting the load in the dishwasher. Imagine doing your food prep and just calling out for the oven to be preheated to 220, or sitting on the couch watching the cricket and calling out to see how long until that meat-pie is ready. We are at the point of using our devices to work for us rather than the other way around.

The addition of wearable integration is a nice touch. The Apple Watch continues to become more and more useful and the extension from Whirlpool into this space just backs it up even further. From your watch you would be able to monitor and control your appliances, see what they are doing and make adjustments as required. Your phone can stay in your pocket and you wont need to yell out to your smart speaker.

The whole range from Whirlpool has added levels of smart functionality while not looking like a computer. There are no large screens that make it a daunting experience and no instruction manual required. These appliances could easily sit in any kitchen without a complete redesign, they would be walked passed without a hint of them being “techie” and most importantly they let your food speak for itself without the appliance stealing the show.

The whole appliance range will come to stores throughout 2018, as we aren’t generally replacing appliances every day you do however need to ensure that those building a new home consider how future proof their appliances will be.

[ces18]