Wink's second-generation smart home hub, launched in 2016 for $99, bridging Z-Wave, Zigbee, Lutron Clear Connect, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi devices through a cloud app that was originally free. In May 2020 Wink gave owners about a week's notice that app, voice and automation control would require a $4.99/month subscription, then suffered week-plus cloud outages in 2021 and 2022.
This entry is written from the 5 sources listed at the bottom of the page. The numbers are our editorial estimates drawn from that material, not measurements, and no statistical sample sits behind them.
The pattern in the sources is regret. Only 14% of owners say they would buy it again, and satisfaction falls from 7.5 to 1.5 out of 10 by the two-year mark.
In its early years the Wink Hub 2 was a well-reviewed, easy, free hub that tied many device brands together. The regret arrived later, when Wink demanded a monthly fee on a week's notice and then left paying owners stranded by long outages, pushing many to rebuild their homes on other platforms.
Outages in 2021 and 2022 dragged on for a week or more with little communication. Aging hubs failing with no replacement hardware available.
Worth it for: No one today - the platform is effectively abandoned; Existing owners with simple setups who already pay. Think twice if: Anyone building a new smart home; Owners who need reliable security or door alarms; Subscription-averse buyers.
Our reading of how sentiment moves across an ownership period, drawn from the sources below. It is an editorial estimate, not tracked longitudinal data.
| At purchase | 7.5 / 10 |
|---|---|
| First week | 7.4 / 10 |
| One month | 7.2 / 10 |
| Six months | 6.8 / 10 |
| One year | 6.0 / 10 |
| Two years or more | 1.5 / 10 |
Owner reviews move this score. The researched figure stays visible next to it, so you can always see what the sources said before anyone voted.
Leave a review on the live pageEvery complaint and every piece of praise above traces back to these. The summaries are ours; nothing is quoted, and no link, quote or username anywhere on this site is invented.
Dec 2016 review of the $99 hub: easy setup, wide device and protocol support, intuitive app and free to use, but simplistic logic and incomplete device controls.
May 2020: Wink announced a $4.99/month plan launching a week later; non-subscribers would lose app access, voice control, the API and all automations.
Early-2021 outage of at least a week hit integrations, hub and API; frustrated users on the Wink subreddit said they were moving to Hubitat and SmartThings.
July 2022 server crash left hubs inoperable for two weeks, with roughly ten days of silence before Wink emailed users with no ETA.
Feb 2025 owner thread: a five-year-old hub keeps failing; replies say no new hubs or updates since 2017, replacing means re-adding devices, though one household still values its simplicity.