Leviton DW15R-1BW Decora Smart Wi-Fi Tamper Resistant Outlet, No Hub Required, Works with Alexa and Google Assistant, 1-Pack, White

The old design, DW15S, had side terminals and was easier to fit in the electrical box. This new design has 5 flying leads including "traveler" which can be cut off, but essentially means you have to jam an additional 24 inches of wire, four wire nuts and the oversized switch into the box. Why not side terminals like every other switch and outlet!!!

The 2nd Gen switches/dimmers now have 5 lead wires hanging from the box instead of screw terminals. This made the installation of a switch and dimmer today much longer to do. Last week, I had to do a 3-gang box (all 1st Gen switches) because one of them failed. Replacing it with a new 2nd Gen switch was a pain in-the-you-know-what. Had to redo the whole box because of the different wiring. If there were screw terminals, most of the time it's simply backing off the old switch/dimmer (dumb or smart) and "dropping in" the new (with the exception on the neutral wires).Though the 2nd Gen switches/dimmers are a bit shallower, having to now use wire nuts and addition of lead wires adds EXTRA stuff being pushed in the workbox. You are NOT saving on space. I ended up cutting back several lead wires to save on space.I haven't had enough time to comment about performance but I did notice that these connected to Wi-Fi extremely fast vs the 1st Gen switches/dimmers that I have - within seconds(!!) of the power being turned back on after installation.

A review is sometimes only as good as the experience of the person who is leaving it. For this reason, I often ignore some reviews and give much more weight to others. I will begin by saying that I have over 20 years experience as a computer technician and have a family full of people who work in trades (plumbing, heating, air conditioning, and electric) so my home network and my electrical system are in solid working order. I have a wireless mesh network blanketing my property and there are no dead spots anywhere in my house. Here is my review of this item:(1) Ergonomics. Unlike other switches, this Leviton switch is a completely smooth, flat, featureless plastic surface. It is impossible to reliably locate the on button in complete darkness - it is exactly the same as the off button. While you can talk to it (and that has its own issues), the buttons should be easy to locate with your eyes closed and should be slightly illuminated so that you can see it but not be annoyed by it.(2) Connectivity. As you will see in other reviews dating back to 2017, the devices bings and bongs, bleeps and beeps, randomly and annoyingly throughout the day and night. It disconnects from the internet whenever it feels like it. My wireless access points are not more than 20 feet away and not one of my 4 Leviton switches can maintain a solid connection. The Tp-Link Kasa switch that is directly next to it has zero connectivity issues, and all my mobile devices have no issues with the home wifi. Leviton's response to my email is that the wifi is getting affected by the fact that it is installed in a metal box with a metal cover. "Unfortunately, for wireless in-wall devices, metal wall boxes or metal wall plates typically attenuate the signal, so even if connected, it could be intermittent. While we recognize that it is difficult to change a metal wall box, if you can, we recommend using Leviton Decora wall plates." If this is true, then why aren't the competitors' smart switches affected by the metal? As you can see in my photo, the Tp-Link Kasa switch is right next to the Leviton switch and has never had any connectivity issues.(3) Lighting Performance. To dim or brighten the lights, you must hold down the power on or off buttons. It makes the job very imprecise. In addition, every Leviton switch produces an audible hum over the internal speaker whenever the dimmer is used (I have halogen as well as LED bulb fixtures and it happens on all of them). Maybe because it is so compact, Leviton needs to shield the internal speaker from the feedback of the dimmer. I do not know why it happens but it happens on all four of mine.(4) Smart Home Performance. Occasionally, I will tell Alexa to turn on the lights, she will say "OK", and nothing will happen. I tell her to turn them off, she says "OK", and nothing happens. I then have to completely reset the switch and join it to my Alexa network. I have never had to do this with my Alexa Echo or my cheaper switches from Leviton's competitors. Other times, I will send it a voice command and it will stutter and lock up. When I try to use the switch to "drop in" on another Alexa device, it completely locks up the device and says "Calling with Alexa is not supp...Calling with Alexa is not supp...Calling with Alexa is not supp..." in a loop. Leviton says it is a known bug. Leviton has now informed me that using the switch to make a call is not supported, even though it has both a mic and a speaker and is connected to Alexa. Um... why not?Bottom LineIf you expect this to be an Alexa Echo inside your wall, it is not and it probably never will be. If you expect it to do its job as a dimmable light switch, it will do a poor job of it when compared to switches that are a quarter of the price. If Amazon is your smart home platform of choice, buy an Alexa Echo for half the price of this switch and you will get all the features along with some decent quality speakers. Then, buy your remaining switches from Tp-Link Kasa (pictured in the photo) or another capable manufacturer to round out your smart home purchase. I had high hopes for these switches but they are all being returned after 2 months of struggling to make them work.

I have some version of these switches controlling nearly everything in my house. I started replacing my switches a few years ago with the Gen1 switches and just recently finished out with the Gen2. The only switches that aren't these are my bathroom exhaust fans. I've written quite a lot here so congrats if you make it through to the end.The switches I have in use now are:DW6HD (Gen1 600W Dimmer)DW1KD (1000W Dimmer, Gen1 but still uses leads instead of screws)DW15S (Gen1 Switch)DW4SF (Gen1 4 Speed Fan Controller, also uses leads over screws)D26HD (Gen2 600W Dimmer)D215S (Gen2 Switch)DAWDC (Gen2 wireless dimmer companion)DAWSC (Gen2 wireless switch companion)Overall I am very happy with my switches. I have not had issues with constant dropping as some have said here. The app works well and I really like the Away feature in it though the same can be accomplished through Alexa. Integration with Alexa works fine. Alexa usually picks up a new switch and let's me know it's connected before I can finish entering the name I want for the device. That's not an issue as it updates automatically once I enter the name I like. They also integrate well with Samsung SmartThings. I use that as I was accidentally sent some ZWave Leviton switches when I ordered WiFi ones so I put them to use rather than throwing them away as Amazon suggested. I also really like that for anyone visiting they work just as you'd expect a normal switch to vs using something like smart bulbs where if the power gets cut things can go a bit funny. My OCD also likes that these don't stick out/lean one way or the other when switched on/off. They're very unassuming looking which to me is good.My house is only a few years old, none of the switch boxes are metal and just about everywhere has a neutral wire already in the box. The only places I had issues were in some of the 3-way switches where whoever wired the house seemed to cut some corners and didn't run all the wiring these require, along with not keeping things in their standard place (e.g. red wire hot, black wire traveler, etc.) so for a while some of my 3-way switches weren't 3-way. The Gen2 wireless switch companions remedied this though.Like many others, in general I prefer the screw terminals. However, there were a couple of instances where having the leads was handy. For the neutral wire I did like using the lead as it is more flexible than cutting a piece of 14/2 and using that. In my kitchen dual gang box, which was very crowded even before I changed the switches, it did actually save me some space as I could get rid of the extra rigid wiring and use the existing wire nut already in the box on the house neutrals so I wasn't adding anything. The other instance I preferred the leads was in a bedroom. Whoever wired the boxes liked to strip a portion of the hot wire, loop that around the hot terminal on the switch and then terminate the hot wire on the second switch in the box rather than using a wire nut with two leads coming off of it. Both switches were connected on a continuous hot wire. I was able to cut the wire down to the stripped part and then just nut both switch hot/black wires to the house hot wire. The looping method they used is a pain with the screw terminals on the Gen1, but I've made it work before. The leads made that easier however, overall I would prefer the screw terminals.The wireless switch/dimmer companions are awesome. They solved my 3-way wiring issue and are super easy to setup. I was afraid there may be some delay after pushing the rocker, but it's an instant response. If you're using Gen2 switches and wish you had a 3-way light somewhere you don't these make a really easy fix for that especially since you can stick them to a bare wall with the included adhesive pads. Hopefully the battery life lives up to the stated 5 years, but I won't hold my breath.I also really like the fan controllers. I have pull chain ceiling fans without remotes in all bedrooms and the living room and these make it really to control the fan speed either with the switch itself, voice, or an app. Much better than my short wife trying to stand on something to pull the chain.Gen1 vs Gen2As stated above, overall I like the screw terminals better than the leads on the Gen 2.Updating the switch firmware is easier on Gen2. In the My Leviton app you can choose to Update All Gen2 switches at once. For Gen1 switches you have to do them individually still. Gets old fast when you have a lot of them. The addition of the wireless switch companions for Gen2 is great. I don't use Apple Homekit so I can't speak to how Gen2 works there.ISSUESMost of the issues I've encountered have been more the fault of the house wiring or some other external factor rather than an issue with any of the switches themselves, but they're not without fault.-- Some LED bulbs just don't play nice with the dimmers. Maybe this is my fault for trying the less expensive bulbs, but I've noticed the EcoSmart from Home Depot don't always dim very well. Other brands work better, but I have yet to find an LED bulb/switch combo that gives 1) the dimming range or 2) dimming smoothness and 3) no flicker on dimmer settings than 100% of an incandescent bulb. You can get one or two, but not all 3.-- I have had some disconnects. I haven't had enough that I'd call it unusable or a deal breaker, but it happens. Most things with wifi will sometimes drop. This is much easier to deal with on the dimmer switches since you can pull out the bottom dimmer rocker and it cuts power to the switch effectively letting you reset its connection. I wish the plain switches had something similar where I could cut their power without having to flip a breaker. Honestly, when a non-dimmer isn't connected I don't do anything. It'll eventually reconnect but sometimes it's a day and sometimes it's a few days. If there was an easily accessible reset button on the plain switch that would make things so much easier.-- I have had 1 switch (out of 26) just up and die on me... so far any way. It was in my super crowded kitchen dual gang box which I think contributed to its death. However, and this is a plus, Leviton support was great. They walked me through some steps (which I had already tried, but I understand they need to check their boxes) and then they sent me a new switch. It was all handled very well, no run around or anything. Also, since it was a Gen1 switch that has been discontinued they replaced it with a Gen2 equivalent.Overall I am very pleased with the switches and how they operate day to day. If the one hadn't died and they could address the resets on the plain switches I'd give them 5 stars all day. I'm not sure who to blame for the dimming, if it's Leviton or LED bulbs in general so for the moment I won't hold that against them. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.

I have 9 of these switches (Generation 1), that have worked flawlessly for 2 years on Apple's HomeKit. The Gen 2 switch I purchased has constant "No Response" status on Apple HomeKit (more than 50% of the time). I have deleted the device, reconfigured and re-powered multiple times with no improvement. Looks like the firmware needs updating. Reminds me of the older Gen 1 firmware issues when this product originally came out. Hope Leviton takes the necessary steps. It is a good product, but cannot invest $60 a pop for 50% functionality. Would not recommend until updated firmware comes out.** Update Sept 6/21 (Changing to 4 stars) - Leviton has been very helpful trouble shooting this issue. I now have the GEN #2 unit functioning properly. Updating the firmware to 1.0.29 was key point. Also missing a selection on one of my wireless WiFI SSIDs to enable "enhanced MultiCast". Gen 2 seems to use a slightly different technology. Great support from Leviton Tech support! Will be purchasing more units.

Just installed a handful of these 2nd Gen WiFi switches, I love them!Easy to add the devices to the My Leviton App (which is really nice!) once I did that I could quickly add my schedules and do my room grouping, barely have to touch the lights at all anymore, they are on or off when they are supposed to be! And I love that I can use my Alexa or a Google or even Siri to do voice control! My "goodnight" activity is the best, so easy!already looking at adding some 4-button controllers and the DWVAA Voice dimmer to my house!

Connection - as 1-2-3. Registration at the application, email confirmation, easy and even intuitive device connection and configuration. Application is very comfortable and easy to learn. Lot of features.Working as charm!Google Assist friendly!Very recommended, I took two like this and definately will order more in a future.

Just had a few of the WiFi switches and dimmers installed in my house, they are great.the My Leviton App is very easy to use and I love that I can make changes from my computer! Now my lights work for our family's schedule, one less thing to think about! I like how I can now program my outside lights to come on at sunset and off at sunrise.A huge bonus that they work with my Google Home, I only have a 'goodnight' activity set up but it is so handy.Definitely worth the price, I used so "off brand" units in the past and they just broke or didn't dim well after a few months.

First of all, I don't think there is one good thing I have to say about this product, honestly I am beyond disappointed.I bought this product with the intention of using it with Philips Hue bulbs as it drives me nuts that I have to have battery powered remotes all over the house if I plan to turn on and off lights, properly, without the use of voice. I thought this was exactly what I was looking for; it replaces a light switch with a bunch of buttons that control Wi-Fi devices! Ha no. All this can do is connect to other Leviton switches, which seems insane to me... why would I want to replace a switch that has a purpose with a device that requires the switch to be there to function? But wait, it supports IFTTT! This is where it got me, I admit, I didn't realize what this meant when I made the purchase, aside from the fact that it was supposedly what allowed compatibility with Philips Hue. Rather than creating a device that works with Google or Apple services, Leviton decided to instead support IFTTT, another app service which essentially acts as a glue to bind Leviton with random other things. Cool, that's fine, I have to download and sign up for another service which is a pain but if it works, I'm happy! Except it doesn't. IFTTT allows you to set up 3 connections before requiring you to pay a 7 dollar per month service fee. 3 devices? No, 3 connections! Each button counts as one connection, so you can't even fully set up all 4 buttons without paying. What's even better is that both Leviton and IFTTT send all your requests to the cloud to figure out what to do. As a result, I experienced around 4-5 seconds of delay from the time I pressed a button to turn on a light until it actually turned on.Other things of note;-build quality of the buttons is just ok, the 4th button on mine is spongey instead of clicky-install instructions are ok but once you get to the point where you need the app, it just says 'follow the instructions in the app', but the app instructions are garbage, the whole app is garbage-trying to connect the device to Wi-Fi was the most painful setup experience I've ever had, it failed multiple times in multiple different ways before it got stuck in a loop of my phone not being able to connect to the product anymore. I was finally able to connect to it and finish setup by digging out my old phone, downloading the app, and restarting the entire process-I wasted multiple hours trying to get this thing to work as I wanted when I was expecting it to take less than half an hour-I will never buy another product from Leviton