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When it comes to lighting, home theaters can present unique challenges. You could, of course, opt for a projector as a cheap option in your DIY basement home theater, but projectors work best with no ambient lighting at all. If a large TV is the focal point of your home theater, then you don’t want the surrounding lighting to draw too much attention away from the screen. Setting up screen-mirroring smart lights, however, can enhance your experience by syncing to the content you’re watching. With this smart lighting feature, you can leverage LEDs to throw onscreen colors onto the wall, effectively extending the content you’re watching beyond the boundaries of your screen.
Screen mirroring lights can be divisive, though. Some find that they increase immersion — particularly for sci-fi media or vivid animations — while others complain that they’re distracting. Not sure if you’ll enjoy reactive backlighting? Both Govee and Nanoleaf offer desktop apps you can use to program some of your existing Govee or Nanoleaf lights to mirror the colors on your monitor. Use your computer to play some games or watch a movie, then see if you like the mirroring effect on your current smart lights. If you do, there are a host of smart light product options that can elegantly deliver screen mirroring effects in your home theater.
Normally, you can mix and match smart light brands at your leisure. But because screen mirroring is an advanced smart light feature that requires you to stay within a single product ecosystem, we’ve focused on products from only three brands — Philips Hue, Govee DreamView, and Nanoleaf — that have ratings of four stars or higher. Each brand offers a wide selection of lamps, bulbs, bars, and other fixtures that can work together to build stunning and immersive full-room light displays. For the best results, we suggest using smart LEDs that are projected onto a wall and emit diffuse light when they’re in your direct field of view.
First things first — why Matter support matters
To ensure cross-compatibility with all major smart home brands, we recommend choosing smart lights that work with Matter. But what is Matter, anyway? It’s a relatively new open-source smart home standard created by a coalition of Apple, Google, Amazon, Samsung, and many other smart home manufacturers. Matter lets you port your smart products to different ecosystems, meaning their core features would be usable without being tied to individual manufacturers’ apps. In this way, Matter essentially future-proofs your smart home gadgets. And for that reason, Matter support is an excellent smart light feature to look out for, even if you’re choosing lights for screen mirroring.
Matter ensures that a basic set of smart features will always be available to you without needing to rely on a single manufacturer’s proprietary app, without needing cloud access, and regardless of which smart home hub you’re using. With the Matter protocol, you can easily share control of your devices in a mixed household, and you’re not tied to a single voice assistant, either. So, ignoring Matter support when designing your smart home would be a pretty big mistake!
At this point, you may be wondering — if Matter enables cross-brand support for smart devices, why can’t you choose whatever smart light fixtures you want for screen mirroring and ignore the manufacturer? Unfortunately, while you can use Matter to adjust standard smart light parameters like color and brightness, you can’t use it for screen mirroring. Matter is an evolving standard that’s still extremely useful for lighting and beyond, but to use advanced screen mirroring features, you’ll still need to stick to one smart light manufacturer for the time being — and, by extension, the brand’s companion app.
Reactive backlighting driver systems
First, you’ll need a way of telling your smart lights the colors your screen is displaying. Some TVs, such as the Philips Ambilight, offer built-in backlighting. But if you’re not looking to buy a whole new TV, you can instead add a reactive backlighting driver system to your existing unit that analyzes onscreen content to generate color-changing effects. The only question is: which ecosystem should you buy into?
If you want to stick with Philips Hue, you’ll need a Hue Play sync box, a device that extracts information about what you’re watching — such as color data — via HDMI input. While it’s a superb product, it’s pricy and doesn’t come with any lights. You’d therefore have to purchase the Hue Play sync box for about $384.99 on top of any Hue lighting, plus the Hue Bridge to connect them all.
For more budget-conscious buyers, a better solution would be to use the Govee DreamView system through its AI Sync Box 2 (which you can grab on Amazon for $259.99 or at Best Buy for $239.99, known to go on sale for $199.99). It also uses HDMI signal analysis to output the best possible color quality, and it even comes with an LED strip designed for the back of your TV. The Govee DreamView system can be extended to a maximum of 10 Govee lights without additional hardware. If you’d rather not interfere with the HDMI signal — or if you’re using your smart TV’s built-in OS to watch content — the Nanoleaf 4D Screen Mirror (typically $99.99 at Best Buy) uses a clever camera-based solution to “watch” up to a 65″ screen, analyze the display, and mirror the colors in real time to the included LED strip, as well as other Nanoleaf lighting.
Floor lamps
Depending on how far from the wall your TV is placed, LEDs on the back can project light approximately one foot out from the edges of your screen. But for a more dramatic effect on either side of your home theater, a pair of floor lamps will work like a charm. Philips Hue, Govee, and Nanoleaf all have floor lamps on offer that are well reviewed and broadly similar in features. Remember to buy a pair, though, and not just one!
At 60 inches tall and offering a maximum output of 1,700 lumens, the Matter-compatible Nanoleaf Multicolor Floor Lamp ($99.99 on Amazon) would work well for extending either side of your screen via mirroring. Govee also offers built-in DreamView compatibility for movies and games, as well as Matter compatibility, in its second generation Govee Floor Lamp 2 ($127.99 on Amazon). Unlike its predecessor, the Floor Lamp 2 features an ambient ring of LEDs on the lamp base in addition to the device’s vertical silicone strip light. It also stands 60 inches tall and outputs a maximum brightness of 1,725 lumens.
Philips’ version of this device is the Hue Signe Gradient Floor Lamp. While it’s well reviewed, it’s tough to recommend at its MSRP of just over $360 for a single lamp. That said, you may be able to find it on sale at Best Buy for $272.99. It does also run brighter than the Govee and Nanoleaf alternatives do, offering brightness levels between 1,800 and 2,550 lumens, depending on the white temperature. Stated lumen outputs for smart lighting only apply to white, though, and many colors typically appear dimmer.
LED strips
While all the major smart light ecosystems offer a basic LED strip that can be stuck to any surface, Govee stands out with a truly unique product: the Govee Skyline strip light. It’s not the actual lighting that’s unique — it’s just a regular LED strip — but rather the innovative customizable mounting system that stretches securely from wall to wall, or from ceiling to floor. Placed at the recommended distance from the wall, the effect is a gorgeous diffused light profile that won’t create harsh reflections. It can be used to extend your TV backlighting to the entire upper wall. At $89.99 on Amazon, it’s a little pricier than your average LED strip, but we think it’s well worth it for allowing you to light spots that few other products could.
Depending on your furniture, standard LED strips could also work well under a sofa (facing downwards) or at the rear of your entertainment cabinet. Some 16.4-foot options include the Hue Indoor Light Strip (from $98.99 on Amazon), Nanoleaf’s Matter Smart Multicolor HD Lightstrip ($59.99 on Amazon), and the most cost-effective LED strip option of the bunch, Govee’s RGBWWIC Strip Light 2 Pro ($74.99 on Amazon). Each of these are addressable RGBIC LED strips that can be synced with screen mirroring systems.
Light bars
Light bars are great for placing on a media console at either side of smaller TVs, and they’re also ideal if you find full-height floor lamps too imposing. If you can create spots to lay them flat, you could even use them around your room as wall washer lights.
The Hue Play Light Bars ($89.99 on Amazon for a single unit or $149.99 at Best Buy for a pair) are bright and beautiful, but since they can only output a single color, they can’t display gradients or match too many color segments from your TV. This option would best suit those who want a more subtle backlight effect. While these lights seamlessly integrate with the Hue Play sync box, like all Hue lights do, they need to be paired with a Hue Bridge for full functionality.
Govee, however, has a similar set of TV light bars that you can buy at $49.99 a pair on Amazon. You can stand the lights vertically or mount them horizontally. While not as bright as the Philips alternative, they do offer segment control for more precise content matching and gradients.
Bulbs
If you want to upgrade your existing light fixtures so they have smart screen mirroring features, you have only to replace the bulbs. Just bear in mind that most smart bulbs are incompatible with dimmer circuits or smart switches, since they need to remain powered at all times to be responsive. Technically, smart bulbs consume more electricity than regular LED bulbs, but they still use less than older filament or halogen bulbs do.
Govee’s A19 Smart Light Bulbs are rated superbly, and at only $32.99 for a pack of four, they offer excellent value for the money. Like all Govee devices, they’re controllable via Bluetooth for local control and over Wi-Fi at greater distances. However, to integrate them with Govee DreamView’s screen mirroring feature, you’ll either need to use a Govee AI Sync Box or at least one supported Govee device as a sync center. The Hue Essential A19 bulbs aren’t exorbitantly priced, either — you can buy a pack of four on Amazon for $54.95 or at Best Buy for $59.99. These bulbs use Bluetooth for basic smart controls, but you’ll need to pair them with a Hue bridge for full screen mirroring functionality. If you don’t already have a Bridge in your Philips ecosystem, consider purchasing the starter kit version of the Hue Essential bulbs (regularly priced at $99.99 at both Amazon and Best Buy).
The Nanoleaf A19 bulbs are also a good option, but while their overall ratings are high, many Amazon reviewers have noted connectivity issues with these bulbs. You might have trouble with them if your Wi-Fi isn’t up to scratch, and unfortunately, it’s difficult to predict compatibility in that department. If you’re already in the Nanoleaf ecosystem, though, you can purchase the company’s smart bulbs at either Amazon or Best Buy for $49.99 — you may even find them on sale for $39.99.
Downlighters
If you already have recessed cans in your ceiling for downlights, the lights are simple to replace. Govee offers a pack of four 6-inch RGBWW ceiling lights for as little as $109.99 on Amazon (or $129.99 at Best Buy), which include junction boxes for each light — but as with the Govee A19 bulbs, these downlights don’t natively support DreamView for screen mirroring, so you’ll need a sync box or a sync center device to get them working. Philips offers similar slimline smart downlights, albeit at over double the price; they’re sold individually for $56.53 each on Amazon or $59.99 at Best Buy.
While Nanoleaf also manufactures recessed slimline downlights, they’re reviewed quite unfavorably. This is likely because they use Matter over Thread rather than Matter over Wi-Fi. While both use the Matter smart home standard, the latter uses your existing Wi-Fi signal. Matter over Thread is an entirely new kind of wireless network that needs additional hardware known as a Thread Border Router, which is similar to your Wi-Fi router. However, users are often unaware of the additional complications that Thread brings.
It’s also worth noting device limitations when using either the Govee DreamView or Hue Play Box screen mirror systems. Whichever one you use, you can only sync up to 10 devices. That’s usually plenty, but since each recessed light counts as a single fixture, you may find yourself hitting the limit quickly in larger rooms.
Dimmer control
Not sure if you want fancy, color-changing, screen-reactive immersive lighting? Maybe you just want the lights to dim when you start your movies and shows. If you already have dimmable lights and simply want to add some smarts to the existing circuit, the TP-Link Kasa HS220 Smart Dimmer Switch (one of our picks for smart lighting gadgets on Amazon under $30) is a great Matter over Wi-Fi solution. It’s a single-pole dimmer switch, with the main caveats being that you’ll need neutral wiring and a 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi connection for it to work. Neutral wiring is standard in homes built later than the mid-’80s, but the only way you can be sure your switch has neutral wiring is by opening it up. Don’t attempt any electrical work unless you’re a trained professional, though.
To really automate your lightning for maximum effect, you’ll want something like the TP-Link Kasa Smart Plug with Energy Monitoring, which you can purchase on Amazon for just $14.99. With this device, you could set an automation routine to dim your lights when the plug measures a wattage output greater than a specified amount, such as when the TV is turned on. And that’s just one of many clever ways to use smart sensors around your house!
Methodology
For this list, we’ve chosen different types of smart light fixtures that emit diffuse light so as not to be distracting while you watch films or play games at your home theater. All selected products can work as part of a wider screen mirroring ecosystem, and each one holds reviews of four stars or greater on Amazon, Best Buy, or both. For all smart light options, we chose to spotlight three reputable brands: Philips Hue, Nanoleaf, and Govee.
