Google announced the end of support for early Nest Thermostats in a support document earlier this year that largely flew under the radar. As of October 25, first and second generation units released in 2011 and 2012, respectively, will be unpaired and removed from the Google Nest or Google Home app.
Users will no longer be able to control their thermostats remotely via their smartphone, receive notifications, or change settings from a mobile device. End-of-support also disables third-party assistants and other cloud-based features including multi-device Eco mode and Nest Protect connectivity.
On the other hand, one can understand why Google doesn’t want to continue to pour resources into an ancient platform just to keep it on life support.
Bullshit. “Pour” my ass. Issue a legacy build of the app that controls them and walk away. What horseshit. This is shameful. The only reason it won’t blow up into a huge debacle is that these products targeted wealthy early-adopters in the first place and those folks can afford to upgrade, and most probably already have.
This is exactly why I didn’t buy one of these or the Amazon version. I didn’t trust that the devices would work as long as they could function and was correct.
I’ve got one but I bought it from Nest, not Google. TBH I’m surprised it was supported this long, not in a thankful way but because Google is so anti consumer. I didn’t realize the app didn’t work until I saw this post. I’m glad to find out now, not during a heatwave where I’m trying to cool the house when I’m driving home.
Dumb thermostats last for multiple decades.
As do smart thermostats that don’t rely on the continued goodwill of any corporation to function.
Which ones are those?
My Honeywell one is not Internet connected, but it seems plenty smart. It knows the time and day, is programmable for four different periods each day, can handle all sorts of heating and cooling equipment. It also learns how long it takes to get your house to the right temp, then starts working before then to make it happen when the time arrives.
I saw the photo with a person for scale and I thought…why?
One of the apartments I lived in had a Honeywell wifi connected one that worked pretty well.
Z-wave thermostats don’t require Internet connectivity to function or control remotely. They do require something like Home Assistant for that remote control.
A simple open api could extend the life of these things by decades.
Surprisingly, these still work as dumb thermostats after the cutoff date.
Uhh, isn’t this just turning them into dumb thermostats? It says you can’t control it via phone. Not that it stops working altogether.
This isn’t “end of support.”
This is “loss of functionality.”
Totally inexcusable.
Samsung did something similar with one of their tablets when they remotely removed an app that provided an IR remote function - a primary reason for my purchase. Samsung’s support not so politely told me, “Too fucking bad.” when I objected.
There was something I could do about it though. Even though a replacement 3rd party app was less than $5 I haven’t purchased another Samsung consumer product or service in almost a decade.
They were rude to you about it too? Jesus. I’m pleased to say I’ve never bought any Samsung product.
The biggest mistake I made in my home was installing $3k in Nest gear, right before they were purchased by Google and the forthcoming Homekit support was abandoned. I cannot wait to get my Ubiquiti camera drops wired so I can stop paying the whopping $20/mo for cloud storage that was $8/mo when I started.
Tl;dr: Fuck Google
Oh how kind of them! They force disconnect an appliance but give you a coupon to buy the latest model.
And the newest model is different how? It’s a thermostat after all.
Whole reason I got one was because of the promised savings (never saw any, from the learning, just bullshit offers that allowed the electric company access…).
Guess it’s back to the tried and true mercury thermostat.
See also: Enshitification
Twenty years ago Google was a small, fun startup that was easy to be a fan of. How the mighty have fallen. “Do no evil,” huh? Disgusting.
Jokes on them, I block my Nest from talking to the Internet so my electrical company cannot control the damned thing. They had control even after I opted out and Google insisted they unenrolled me in the energy savings plan. Don’t enroll in these plans [insert it’s a trap gif].
That “Smart Energy” discount has shown up in mailings for the last few years and I’ve considered signing up despite my general dislike of allowing any company more control of my life than they already have.
Why do you say they’re a trap? Did they change your thermostat settings far more than they claim or pull other BS you didn’t expect?
Smart Energy Discount issues from the personal view of a consumer.
These plans work by sending you notifications that they will be reducing your thermostat for you when there is an energy crunch.
Sounds good so far, here’s the issues I had:
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Let’s say you are a good consumer and let them change your thermostat to 85’F when it’s 100’F every single time… You saved… $5!!! and got to sweat profusely in your own home in the process.
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Let’s say you were working in the yard and come in sweaty and needing to cool off or you have a hot flash for some reason. If you change that thermostat while they are in control of it, you lose your whole $5 for not just that day, but the entire billing cycle.
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Let’s say you want to exit the plan. Now you’re on the hook to wait on hold with your energy company for hours waiting for the one department and probably one person who can unenroll you. Chances are likely even then that they can screw it up and like in my case, both Google and my southern California electrical company claim ignorance anything was done wrong yet keep me enrolled.
In short and in summary: It’s a trap because the savings is far, far too small for the sacrifice.
Thanks for that write-up. I’ll continue to ignore the electric company’s marketing efforts and remain blissfully disconnected.
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This sort of thing is one of the reasons I chose a RainMachine irrigation controller over other options, because they specifically marketed their cloud-independent firmware design. It was vindicated a couple years ago when they started going defunct and grasped for recurring revenue by billing for proxied remote access, but even then they emphasized that everything else would continue to function without their servers.
The onus is on the consumer to reward cloud-independent designs like this. While it has been sad to see RainMachine’s collapse, my device indeed just keeps working. Hopefully it isn’t ultimately killed by firmware or app security vulnerabilities since it’s now thoroughly unmaintained.
I dipped my toes into “smart” thermostats with a Wyze. Meh. I don’t really need to set the temp from my phone, or any of the other features, beyond having a simple schedule. I’m seriously considering reverting all the way back to an old-school bimetal strip, dial on the wall type, in private protest of all this crap.
(Don’t get a Wyze. I think they’ve been discontinued anyway. The damn thing loses connection to the wifi three or four times per year, then I need to go through the ENTIRE setup process again, from the very beginning. The wifi antenna is in the closet not three feet away. POS.)
Smart home = control over you. Just don’t do it.
This is a blanket statement that doesn’t really hold up.
Commercial off the shelf cloud service based smart home = control over you.
Fully self hosted smart home = control over your house.
Those things should be zwave or matter or something sensible, not WiFi anyway.
I’m imagining some poor rube who bought fully into the IoT. Like every appliance they own is smart. Then one day they wake up to their entire house no longer functioning because the smart devices can’t connect to whatever services they need. Can’t even work the smart locks on their doors.
IoT isn’t exactly reliable and many, including the rich are trying to reverse the IoT trend: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lifestyle/real-estate/tech-free-homes-luxury-trend-1236177909/
also
https://www.axios.com/2025/10/23/analog-bag-screen-free-wellness
Pretty much happening if support disappears for 2.4GHz wifi. Most of these smart devices require it, and many wifi routers don’t even bother transmitting it unless you specifically activate that option.
With Google’s track record of jumping into a market and after they have millions of users shutting it down, I’m surprised they didn’t do this years ago.
How long before Honeywell does the same? The company spun off their residential services division (including thermostats) about 7 years ago and at first things were fine, but in the last couple of years the service has become increasingly unreliable. Their servers have gone down quite a few times and settings changes are sometimes delayed even when the servers are up.
Their Z-Wave thermostat is a nice upgrade without concerns about someone sitting in a corporate America e-suite deciding to pull the plug.
Glad I chose not to link my info to it to continue using the feature when Google took over.
Was hoping something like Homebridge could be used to still control these, but so far no luck. After the cutoff they can be used manually like a traditional thermostat, which is a surprise coming from Google. I still fear they are going to generate a bunch of ewaste from people replacing them.
Maybe time for home assistant to roll out their own thermostat made with esphome
