The number of smart homes in Europe and North America reached 105 million in 2021, according to new research from the IoT analyst firm Berg Insight. The most advanced smart home market is North America, having an installed base of 51.3m smart homes at the end of the year. This represents a penetration rate of 36 per cent. During 2021, the number of smart homes in North America grew by 13 per cent year-on-year. The strong market growth is expected to continue in the next years. By 2026, Berg Insight estimates that about 74.6 million homes in North America will be smart, equal to 50  per cent of all homes in the region. The European market is still behind the North American, in terms of market penetration. There was a total of 53.7m smart homes in Europe at the end of 2021. The installed base in the region is forecasted to reach about 100m homes at the end of 2026, representing a market penetration of 42 per cent.
 
The most popular smart home products include smart thermostats, smart light bulbs, smart security cameras, smart door locks, smart plugs and smart speakers. These products, which have sold in the hundreds of millions, are marketed by incumbent OEMs such as Signify, Resideo, Danfoss, Belkin, Chamberlain and Assa Abloy and newer entrants such as Ecobee, Mysa, Nuki, Arlo, Netatmo, IKEA and Wyze Labs.

The market for whole-home systems is served by traditional home automation specialists, home security providers, telecom operators and DIY solution providers. On the North American market, interactive home security systems have emerged as one of the most common types of smart home systems. The largest home security providers include ADT, Vivint and Comcast. In Europe, traditional home automation systems and DIY solutions are more common as whole-home systems. eQ-3, Centrica, Verisure and Somfy are the largest vendors of whole-home systems in the region. The installed base of whole-home systems in Europe and North America amounted to 20m systems and 30m systems respectively at the end of 2021.
 
The report notes that smart and connected home solutions are now becoming ubiquitous and in many product categories, connectivity is a standard feature. However, a connected product does not automatically equal an intelligent solution that adds real value for homeowners.

“There is much left to work on for the participants in the smart home market before the true smart home is realized, in which products and systems from different vendors work seamlessly together and automatically make adjustments optimized for the individual user”, said Berg Insight Senior Analyst, Martin Mr. Backman. “The much-anticipated smart home standard Matter, which is planned to be launched during 2022, holds great potential to solve many of the issues that hampers adoption of smart home solutions today.”