Christmas lights, with their colorful blinking LEDs, have long made for a fun and festive holiday decoration. Problem is, they usually come with preset color and blinking sequences, so you’re limited to enjoying the same patterns over and over. That all changed with the introduction of smart lights, which allowed for custom programming, so you can show off your Christmas colors in more creative ways. The Govee Christmas String Lights 2 improves on one of the best options in the category.
The second generation of Govee’s smart holiday illumination, the new decorative lights use RGBWIC LEDs compared to the RGBIC of the original. That means, this new one gets extra white LED beads, allowing it produce brighter, warmer, and more natural white lighting for an all-around more stunning light display.
The Govee Christmas String Lights 2 are, basically, LED light strips equipped with RGBWIC LEDs, so each one is fitted with a built-in IC chip that enables individual control. Like many modern smart lights, it’s designed to pair with a companion app that you can use to switch among the 130 preset animated scenes, so you get a lot of options straight out of the box without needing to do any custom programming.
Of course, what makes smart lights special is the fact that you can personalize them to your liking. Specifically, the new version of the decorative holiday lights offer a Smart Shape Mapping function that allow the app to recognize the exact way the lights are shaped, whether they’re wrapped around the Christmas tree, mounted up a wall, or hung all over the place. That way, you can get an accurate virtual representation of the lights in the app, making it a lot easier to reconfigure its colors and patterns according to your liking. Because of this programmability, you’re no longer restricted to festive holiday-themed presets, which could make the lights usable even beyond the holiday season.
The Govee Christmas String Lights 2 also enable custom lighting for folks who don’t want to spend the time required to customize it manually. How? By integrating AI, of course. Basically, you can upload an image into the app and have it recreate that image as a lighting effect. They also offer a chat interface that lets you tell the AI what you want, then have it create custom programming based on your instructions, essentially letting you program the lights by simply describing your desired light effects.
The smart Christmas lights are compatible with both Alexa and Google Assistant, so you can prompt it to change presets, set timers, adjust brightness, and more using simple voice commands. It’s also compatible with Matter, so it should work with most upcoming smart home products. It has IP65 waterproofing, so you can use it for smart outdoor lighting even in that winter weather, although you’ll want to keep the adapter indoors since it’s not waterproofed in the same way. The lights are available in four lengths, namely 66 feet with 200 LEDs, 99 feet with 300 LEDs, 164 feet with 500 LEDs, and 328 feet with 1,000 LEDs.
The Govee Christmas String Lights 2 are available now.