Nest Labs has announced that the third generation of its best-selling Nest Learning Thermostat will now be available for purchase for $249 from its website beginning today, the first of September. Images of the device had already leaked last week, giving us a look at the new generation device, which revealed a larger, higher resolution display, and a slimmer profile, which, according to the company, makes the smart thermostat “more beautiful than ever”. In its new avatar, the device will incorporate a feature called ‘Farsight’, which will make the screen light up and display the ambient room temperature or the current time, every time someone enters the room. The new generation device also promises to be the most accurate one as yet from the company because it incorporates more temperature sensors than Nest Thermostats of the past.
The press release from the Google-owned company (Alphabet-owned company, to be precise) also says that it is introducing a new feature with the 3rd generation device, called Furnace Heads-Up, which will point out if there’s a problem with the furnace. “Every heating or cooling season you’ll get a Furnace Heads-Up message on your phone or tablet and the thermostat screen. And you’ll also get a notice in your monthly Home Report”. The feature will eventually also be rolled out to users of the first and second generation Nest Thermostats by the end of this year. The company is also making claims of saving on energy charges, which it says will be substantial enough for the device to have paid for itself in under two years. “Independent studies showed that it saved people an average of 10-12% on heating bills and 15% on cooling bills”, the press release says.
Taking a quick look at some of the technical specifications, we see that the device comes with a diameter of 3.3-inches and is 1.21-inches wide. The circular screen (24-bit color LCD) is 2.08-inches in diameter, and has a resolution of 480 x 480 pixels, which is a definite step-up from the last generation device’s 320 x 320 display resolution. The thermostat comes with a number of sensors, including temperature, humidity, motion (near-field and far-field) and ambient light. Wireless connectivity includes dual band (2.4 and 5.0 GHz) Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n and 802.15.4 @ 2.4GHz, along with Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE). The Nest Learning Thermostat comes with a rechargeable lithium-ion battery of unspecified capacity and consumes less than 1 kWh of power in a full month of usage, according to Nest Labs.