Nest compatibility with STRV (Smart Thermostatic Radiator Valves)

[Shaarad]

Let's start by explaining how Tado system works. Let's say you have a Tado thermostat in your living room. You als also have Tado Smart Thermostatic Radiator Valves on all your heaters. When you want to go to bed you'd like only your bedroom heater to be set at exactly 18 degrees Celsius while the living room (where the thermostat is) set to 17 degrees Celsius.

Now, imagine doing exactly the same but with a Google nest thermostat, only to find out that it is not possible to heat a specific room separately. Even when connecting everything in Google Home, the boiler won't start up unless the nest is below it's desired temperature. Why is it not possible?

Google Home can see that one STRV is currently below the desired temperature, so why can't it just tell the nest to send a signal to the boiler to operate until the desired temperature of that STRV is reached? The hardware is all there to make this possible! Implementing this in the Google Nest and Google Home would make it really overpowered, and a amazing thermostat and smart home system. 

Instead... I am considering removing my Nest and switching to a Tado thermostat, just so I can efficiently warm my house with STRVs.

Support keeps directing me to a link where the (incorrect) statement is made that Google nest works with smart thermostatic radiator valves. I have not received any examples or evidence of this working and a quick search on forums will confirm that this in fact not (yet) possible. 

Google support, if you read this, please take it a serious potential upgrade for the Google nest. With a software upgrade of Google nest / Google home you'd have one of the best thermostats out there! Please take this seriously and don't direct me to that link with the false statement. Give me evidence or admit it's not possible (which is fine! Just make sure to make it a future update). 

[AlexD]

Thank you for all the feedback provided @Shaarad . I am sorry to hear about your experience and I'll do my best to try and assist. 

To check, you are referring to the How radiator valves work with Nest thermostats page correct? 

To clarify on the functionality with valves, the thermostat is compatible with TRVs. However, the TRVs and thermostat work independently, as you described the behaviour in your post. 

You will control the thermostat separately, it will turn the system on and off based on the temperature set on it and the valves on your radiators will cut and turn on the flow to the radiators based on how they are set. There is no communication currently between the thermostat and any valves and currently I have no information about future availability on this I can share.  

[Shaarad]

Yes, to quote from Google support website:

"Nest thermostats are compatible with various radiator valve types, including Smart thermostatic radiator valves (Smart TRVs)."

This is incredibly misleading since the nest thermostat is not able to communicate with the STRVs. 

I even had a call with best support, and they sent me this email with this false statement:

"I've coordinated this matter with our senior tech team and we'd like to inform you that if you'd like to use smart valves for your Nest Thermostat, the thermostat will be just an on/off switch and the valves will be the one to control the radiator (heating) and the hot water."

I am very disappointed by the lack of knowledge about their own product. 

[AlexD]

I am sorry for any confusion caused. Hopefully I managed to help clear things up. There are certainly scenarios where they can still work together. Let's say you want the living room to be 25 always and you have the thermostat there but you want the bedroom 22, you could have the valve cut the heating there. 

But yes, at the moment they can work together but they work independent of each other. Currently there is no communication between the thermostat and STRV. 

[Shaarad]

For me there is no confusion about the lack of communication with smart thermostatic valves, unfortunately there is confusion at the nest team.

The fact that a company as high tech as Google has not figured out this feature is just surprising to me. 

The whole point of STRVs is to heat one specific room instead of the living room to save energy. 

I hope communication with STRVs will be rolled out on existing nest thermostats in the future as it would significantly increase the smart home market share for Google nest. Thank you for your response, and if you happen to talk to any developers, please bring it up as a feature to be introduced. 

[AlexD]

We always take note of feedback provided, my colleagues are always looking to improve our products and services. More compatibility with more devices can only be a good thing, I would agree. 

Should there be any update on this, it will be posted on our official channels. 

[Vladut]

Hi there, just checking in with you. Did you manage to check the last message my colleague sent?

[Shaarad]

Yes, I have seen it. I am looking forward to see the software update where the nest learning thermostat is able to communicate with STRVs to control the temperature in every room of my house 🙂

Tip, ha e every connected STRV appear as in individual thermostat in the nest app, and have the thermo link stop the boiler only after the desired temperature of all STRVs has been met. 

[Vladut]

Thank you so much. I've just noted down the tip. Let me know if you need anything else.

[Shaarad]

Having each STRV working as an individual thermostat within the Nest Platform with the nest modulation optimization, time to temp and true radiance would make a super awesome Google Nest 😉 

[Vladut]

Thank you so much for your input! Have a good one!