If there's one device that everyone owns – or let's say used to own, given the prevelance of the smartphone in recent years – then it's an alarm clock. Be it a two-bell classic with mechanical ringer by the bedside, or a simpler digital one complete with harsh 'beep beep' sounds or random radio tune-in to awaken you each morning, the alarm clock is a household staple.
Jun 9, 2019 - Here's why the Lenovo Smart Clock is a better fit for your bedside table than the Google Nest Hub. Lenovo’s latest smart display has a singular focus: be a smart alarm clock that you can talk to. But while it’s good at doing that, it leaves room for a lot of improvement.
For 2019 the alarm clock is being dragged into the future; the Google future, via Lenovo, with the aptly named Smart Clock. Designed with simplicity in mind, this bedside buddy houses a 4-inch screen and is the voice-controlled portal onto your Google-organised life (the Amazon Echo Spot isn't a million miles off for an Alexa equivalent, if you're an Amazon user instead).
Back in 2018 we saw the Google Home Hub – which has since been re-named Nest Hub – make for a great central control centre using both Google Assistant voice and touchscreen controls. The Lenovo Smart Clock is like a smaller, stripped down version of this, minus the built-in camera for security reassurance. But is it the classic alarm clock reinvented, or just technological overkill?
Design & Display
- Integrated speaker (1.5in 3W with peak power of 6W) and 2x passive radiators
- Dimensions and weight: 114 x 79 x 80mm; 328g
- Volume up/down physical controls
- 4-inch screen with touch control
- USB port to rear
- Bluetooth 5.0
With the 4-inch display at the front tapering off in a cut-off prism-like shape, the Smart Clock is simple and unfussy by design. It's finished in a soft-touch grey material cladding that looks a lot like the Google Nest Hub's finish – making it look like part of that family, in a sense, even though it's a Lenovo product (with no planned Google branded equivalent, the company says).
That screen is small in scale, but spot on for an alarm clock size. Why would it need to be any larger? After all, it doesn't need to display loads of data: ultimately it's a clock face (multiple faces are selectable), with various Google 'cards' available to swipe through. These displays will vary depending on what you have installed through the Home app: by default it's Alarms and Weather, but more are available through account associtation, such as Calendar.
The Smart Clock has an integrated speaker which, considering the size, sounds perfectly fine. It's not an epic soundsystem by any means – but as a bedside radio it's suited to purpose to get your day started with some tunes. There are physical controls to adjust the volume if you don't want to bark instructions at Google Assistant using your voice; max it out at 10, however, and the sound isn't quite as clear, so we'd leave it towards the middle.
There's also a USB port to the rear which makes a lot of sense, as you can plug your phone into this to recharge, so you won't need a spare plug at the wall. It's not as fast to charge devices from here, though, which is something to take into consideration.
Faces and Brightness
- 10 clock faces to choose from
- Brighter, Dim, Darker low-level brightness
- Manually adjustable brightness and automatic ambient light sensor
The clock face also has an ambient light sensor, so while it's bright in the day, it dims accordingly at night and becomes a black-and-white monotone visual when it's particularly dark to avoid disturbing your sleep.
Well, that's the theory. By default the auto-brightness feature isn't active and it's not obvious how to turn it on really – especially as it can't be sorted by voice and differs to an Android phone setup. On our first night with the Smart Clock we became so disgruntled with its bright light that we unplugged it, vouching to dig through every menu setting on night two. Technology, eh?
But when it does work, it works very well. That mono screen is very dark as to not disturb your slumber. We still think an OLED screen rather than LCD would have been an even more savvy solution, for the ultimate in black-out, but what Google has managed to do with this LCD panel is impressive. There's no way to get the screen to completely switch off, though, which we think some might have found a handy feature.
The clock faces available range from the quirky to the common, easily adjusted by pressing-and-holding the screen and scrolling through the 10-strong collection.
Smart Functionality
- Google Assistant built-in voice control
- Nest Cam stream (if you own one)
- Physical mute switch to rear
- Chromecast integration
- Multi-room audio
The real feature about the Smart Clock that brings it into the future is how it integrates with other smart products. Much like Google Nest Hub, the Lenovo product can be used as an interface to switch on smart lights/plugs, trigger Google Routines at given times – Good Morning and Good Night feature at the relevant times via a swipe down from the top, but you'll have to set these up within the app – and so forth.
As this is Google-centric, any Google Calendar appointments will sync between Android phone and the Smart Clock if you sign in with your account, with the software not only able to present your calendar – but also suggest alarm times and talk you through your upcoming day. It'll likely only get smarter in the future with routings and timings based on additional data too, with things like pre-warnings if traffic is going to be bad and mean you ought to wake up earlier.
Alarms can be switched on or off by using your voice, the touchscreen or physically tapping the product itself to trigger a morning Routine. It's not possible to adjust alarms at present, however, only deactivate them and create a new one, which feels like a removal from how 'smart' Google's system is supposed to be. Downtime can also be set within the app, but not on the Clock itself.
To stop Google listening there's a physical mute microphone button to the rear. Switching it over sees the product bleat out 'the mic is muted' / 'the mic's back on' – which is far from ideal if someone next to you is trying to sleep, and it can't be adjusted in the settings. A little refinement here, however, and this necessary feature would be spot on.
The Smart Clock can also pair with other multi-room speaker devices on your smart network. There's Chromecast integration too, so you can use it as a controller to project content onto a larger screen if you want to watch something before getting some shut-eye. There's Spotify too, so selecting your favourite tracks as a wake-up call is no bother either – although you'll need a pay-for membership to get specific selections.
VerdictSo is the Lenovo Smart Clock the alarm clock reinvented or technological overkill? Well, it depends how much you value Google, its organisational properties – Calendar integration, Alarms, other smart home products and the ability to voice-control them – in addition to having a sensibly sized and well-priced bedside screen-based alarm that can't be used to distract with videos from YouTube and other things that your phone can do.
Even if you're not big into Google and don't have other smart home products then the Smart Clock gets the basics right too. You can voice control it to set an alarm, while the slow wake-up feature gently builds up light output for 30 minutes prior to your scheduled wake up time, for a more natural entry into your day. It's genuinely dark at night and not a bother when the settings are correctly selected too.
Really there are only small tweaks that we would make with the Assistant software being smarter overall and the Google Home app a little simpler. But this stuff is always improving, meaning this Smart Clock will only get smarter and better over time.
Also consider
Amazon Echo Spot
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Google not your thing? More of an Alexa user? Then Amazon's Echo Spot, which is essentially a small circular-screen controller, is a savvy alternative. It's a lot pricier than the Lenovo offering though – almost as much as a Nest Hub, in fact.
The Lenovo Smart Clock is now shipping out to customers. Developed alongside Google, it's a bedside alarm clock that responds to voice commands through Google Assistant. It has a simple touchscreen so you can check your calendar and the weather when you first wake up.
Because it was developed with Google, it was obviously meant to coexist with the Google Nest Hub (formerly the Google Home Hub) in Google's smart home product line. The Nest Hub is a smart display with a more robust touchscreen that can play videos, show you pictures and do lots of other tasks that the Lenovo Smart Clock can't.
The Nest Hub retails for $130 and the Lenovo Smart Clock for $80, but the Nest Hub is frequently on sale for even less than the retail price of the Lenovo Smart Clock. In that case, it can be hard to justify spending roughly the same amount on a device with a less capable touchscreen.
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In my review, I mentioned this as one of the downsides of the Lenovo Smart Clock. You shouldn't buy it expecting all of the same features as a full-sized smart display. You'll be disappointed. That said, the Lenovo Smart Clock is unique enough to stand on its own and it's generally a better gadget if you specifically want a smart gadget for your bedside table. Here's why.
Tech detox
The Lenovo Smart Clock is a better fit if you want to get away from your phone before bed. The Nest Hub can't do everything you can do on a phone, but you can still use it to watch YouTube videos and scroll through images.
The Lenovo Smart Clock is closer in functionality to a smart speaker as the touchscreen only offers a few prescribed functions while still letting you issue any of Google Assistant's recognized voice commands. For certain families, that more limited functionality will be a good thing.
If you want to limit screen time for yourself and your family, the Lenovo Smart Clock offers a viable alternative. You can still see the most pressing pieces of info -- you can check on your security cam, look at your calendar, and see the forecast and your commute.
Lenovo was intentional with the features left out of the Smart Clock. What remains makes sense for your bedside and for the things you need to know when you're going to sleep or first waking up. It offers enough info that you could reasonably turn off your phone without the temptation to keep consuming the vast content of the internet anyway.
Sunrise alarms
You can set an alarm with a voice command to the Google Nest Hub, so you can use it to wake you up, but the Lenovo Smart Clock is designed for that task. It will suggest alarms based on your first appointment the next day. You can set multiple alarms and customize each one. You can change the alarm tones, the snooze length and the volume of the alarm (separate from the volume of the speaker).
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Your alarm can trigger your good morning routine, which will tell you about your calendar and play the news by default. You can also customize the routine to control your smart home devices and more in the Google Home app. This routine won't trigger when you snooze, just when you stop your alarm for good.
My favorite feature of the bunch is the sunrise function. Turn this on, and the screen on the Lenovo Smart Clock will gradually start getting brighter 30 minutes before your scheduled alarm. This wake-up light serves to naturally ease you out of your sleep leading up to your wake-up time and it works great. The Nest Hub could potentially add this feature in a future update, but right now, the Lenovo Clock has it and the Nest Hub doesn't.
Smack to snooze
When your alarm does start buzzing, you can smack the top of the Lenovo Smart Clock to get it to stop. You can customize this so that hitting it will cause it to snooze or stop entirely, which is pretty great. If you use the Nest Hub as an alarm, you can stop it just by saying 'Stop' or you can hit a snooze button on the touchscreen. Neither is an arduous task, and you have those options with the Lenovo Clock too. When I'm groggy in the morning, I get a lot of satisfaction from stopping my alarm with a little bit of brute force.
I almost always hit snooze a couple of times and finding a button on the Nest Hub's screen is honestly more work than I want when I'm still struggling to wake up. Smacking the top of the Lenovo Smart Clock feels right -- a call back to a big snooze button on the top of a traditional alarm clock. The fact that you can customize what happens when you hit it makes it even better.
Sound quality
Believe it or not, the little Lenovo Smart Clock sounds better when it's playing music than the Nest Hub. The Nest Hub isn't exactly a giant device and neither one can do more than fill a room with background music, but Lenovo makes great use of its built-in 3W speaker and two passive radiators.
It sounds pretty good, especially for its size, and doesn't have any noticeable distortion in sound quality, even at max volume. Again, don't expect booming stereo sound -- Lenovo's alarm clock is tiny -- but it's good enough to outclass the tinny and underwhelming sound quality of the Nest Hub.
Fits in better
I love the cute and colorful design of the Nest Hub. It could blend into a wide variety of rooms and Google offers a few color choices for the fabric exterior. The Lenovo Smart Clock just has the one grey fabric finish, but it's perfect for your nightstand.
Neither has a built-in camera and both have a mute switch to help with peace of mind. Plus, they both have an ambient light sensor to minimize glow from the display. But Lenovo's alarm clock is small enough to fit onto any open surface in your bedroom. It has a USB port for charging your phone and the rectangular front is pleasantly reminiscent of old school alarms with a modern twist.
Nevertheless, wait for a sale
The Google Nest Hub is a great smart display. The Lenovo Smart Clock is a great smart alarm clock. Both are helpful smart home gadgets. Yes, they both have Google Assistant built in for voice control and the screen on the Nest Hub does more, but the Lenovo Smart Clock is perfectly suited for what it is. If you specifically want to upgrade your alarm clock with smarts, this cute little gadget from Lenovo is your best option right now.
With that said, the frequent sales on the Nest Hub make the Lenovo Smart Clock seem overpriced. Its more limited functionality makes a lot more sense when it's $50 less than the Nest Hub. Lenovo's full-sized smart display has also gone on sale a few times since it was released last year, and your best bet might be to wait for a similar sale on the Lenovo Smart Clock. Once it's discounted, if you don't need all of the features of the Nest Hub, you can save money by going with the more streamlined bedside gadget.
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