12 Things You'll Want to Know About Your Nest Thermostat

A Nest Thermostat is a great investment for keeping your home comfortable, no matter what the season or weather. With features designed around maximizing efficiency, convenience and comfort, a Nest Thermostat is an easy way to manage your energy use — saving you money in the process.

That’s why more people are looking to add devices like a Nest to their HVAC system. If you want to put in a Nest for your own home, reach out to an expert for smart thermostat installation in Pella.

From auto scheduling to energy efficiency monitoring, Nest helps make controlling the climate of your home effortless.

Curious to learn more? Take a look at 12 things you should know about your Nest Thermostat.

1. How to Reset a Nest Thermostat

The first thing to know about resetting a Google Nest Thermostat is the difference between a restart and a reset.

• Restart: Similar to restarting any electronic device, including your phone or computer, restarting your Nest Thermostat simply turns it off and then back on. This preserves current settings and should be attempted if your Nest is frozen or not connecting to Wi-Fi.
• Reset: Conversely, resetting eliminates most if not all of your preferred settings. In most cases, people resort to a reset when they’re moving to a new home and bringing the thermostat with them, or if they just want to erase all personal info from the Nest before leaving it for the next homeowner.

If you want to perform a reset, it helps to record existing temperature settings so they're still available if you forget or erase them. Next, find Settings -> Equipment and write down the details about your system wires, heating type and safety temperature settings.

Then, to manually restart or reset your Nest, go to Settings, select Reset and press. You will then have five options:

• Restart: Shuts your Nest down and starts it back up while remembering your settings. Another method is to press the outside of the Nest and hold it down for a few seconds until it goes black, at which point you can remove your hand.
• Schedule: This type of reset clears any info about your temperature schedule—including for your hot water, if that has been connected to your Nest. With this option, you’ll have to input a new schedule or wait until the Nest learns your schedule.
• Away: Choosing this reset option removes anything your Nest has learned about how often you walk by, so that it can update the temperature on its own.
• Network: With a network reset, it will remove all your network information and your Nest is disconnected from Wi-Fi. It also forgets your Wi-Fi password.
• All Settings: This reset removes all your personal settings and learning.

2. How to Connect Nest Thermostat to Wi-Fi

Staying connected to your Wi-Fi is important to getting the most out of your Nest.

To connect your Nest to the internet:

• Open the Quick View menu by turning the thermostat ring.
• Select the Settings icon.
• Select Network.
• Once your Nest scans available networks, find your Wi-Fi and, if you have one, put in your password.

3. Does a Nest Thermostat Use a Battery and How Long Does It Last?

Nest thermostats are powered indirectly through HVAC system, but each one also features a rechargeable lithium-ion battery for backup in situations where the power cuts out. According to Google, Nest's manufacturer, a Nest Thermostat battery should last several months. It can be recharged using a USB charger that comes with the Nest.

4. How to Turn Off a Nest Thermostat

If you aren’t going to be in your home for a long time, consider setting your Nest Thermostat to Off mode, though Eco mode would be another option. The Off mode option deactivates your regular heating and cooling schedules, although the Nest will still use your Safety Temperatures to keep your home from getting particularly hot or cold.

To find Off mode on the thermostat:

• Press and hold the touch bar until it displays “Turn Off” and then slide the bar to highlight Turn Off, and then touch the bar to select.
• You can also go to Mode from the main menu and select Off.

Off mode is available on the Google Home app as well:

• Select Thermostat from home screen
• Tap Temperature mode
• Select Off

5. Can Alexa Control a Nest Thermostat?

Yes, Amazon's Alexa is compatible with a Nest Thermostat. Alexa can also be integrated with with Nest doorbells and cameras. You can even operate a Nest Thermostat with Google Assistant.

6. Can a Nest Thermostat Work Without Wi-Fi?

Yes, your Nest Thermostat can control the temperature of your home without Wi-Fi. That being said, being disconnected from Wi-FI means the Nest doesn’t have the ability to use the smart functions that most people enjoy.

7. Are You Able to Lock a Nest Thermostat?

If different members of your family can't agree on the ideal temperature, Nest can help you bring a little order back to your household.

Nest has a locking feature that allows a user to keep it from making any adjustments outside of a preset range. This won't mean you have to make do with just one temperature—a locked Nest continues to use existing program settings—but simply keeps these settings from being changed.

If you want to lock your Nest:

• Select the Settings icon, scroll to the bottom and find Lock.
• Enter a 4-digit pin number you can remember, and then enter it twice.
• For locking a Nest in Heat or Cool mode, define your maximum and minimum temperature range before tapping Lock at the bottom of the screen.

To unlock a Nest, open the settings and choose Unlock. Once you enter your 4-digit pin, your device will be unlocked.

8. Adjusting a Nest Thermostat from Your Phone

Nest thermostats can be controlled by your Google Home app, accessible through your phone as well as a computer. Other versions of Nest, including the Nest Thermostat E and Nest Learning Thermostat, are also compatible with remote control via the Nest app.

Before you can make adjustments for a Nest on your phone with Google Home or the Nest app, you need to follow a few steps:

• Download the Google Home app or, if you have an advanced model, the Nest app to your phone.
• Hook up your Nest Thermostat.
• Access the Google Home app on your phone and follow the instructions to select your account, link to your new device and connect to Wi-Fi.
• Google has created a more comprehensive setup guide, for those needing extra assistance in connecting.

After you've added the Nest to your Home app, it's accessible by clicking Thermostat on the home screen. Once you do that, you can change your Nest temperature by dragging your finger along the screen or tapping on a plus or minus sign.

The preset temperatures on your Nest can also be changed from the app. From the home screen, select Thermostat and then select Settings. Once there, press Temperature Preferences and then Temperature Presets. Current presets for Comfort, Eco and Sleep modes will be displayed. Choose the appropriate setting to change the temperature for that preset.

9. Making a Nest Thermostat Schedule

A Nest allows you to set temperatures schedules either on the device or on the Google Home app. Newer and advanced models of the Nest, such as the Nest Thermostat E and Nest Learning Thermostat, also can be controlled via the Nest app.

You have two primary ways to establish a temperature schedule on a Nest Thermostat:

• Quick Schedule: A Quick Schedule will be based on the national average schedule for energy efficiency. When you are setting up your Nest, the Google Home app gives you the option to change the temperature with a schedule. If you choose that option, it presents a preset schedule before letting you customize it. After you've made all your choices, that’s the schedule it uses.
• Temperature Presets: For changing the Nest's preset temperatures, open the Google Home app and press Thermostat. Then, tap Presets and select Edit. After the changes are complete, select Done.

If you already have a schedule and want to change it, open the Google Home app, select Thermostat and then tap on Schedules. Choose the day of the week where you want to make changes. Once you pick the day, tap Add and find the preset you want. Finally, select Time before touching and dragging the numbers to change the time. Select Done to save changes.

10. Setting a Temperature Range on a Nest Thermostat

Your Nest's Eco mode is great for setting temperature ranges. A key part of this feature is the Nest's ability to adjust the temperature based on whether it detects you at home or not.

To customize the Nest temperature range in Eco mode, go to Settings and select Eco. That should display the current “Heat to” and “Cool to” temperature settings. You can select each and adjust them to your desired temperature. When complete, select Done.

11. What Should I Do If My Nest Thermostat Isn't Compatible?

A Nest Thermostat is compatible with most heating and cooling systems. The maker of Nest, Google, has an online compatibility checker that presents a few questions related to your location and existing setup to learn which Nest model would be compatible with your system.

If you don't think your Nest is compatible with your system, you should get in touch with local pros for smart thermostat installation in Pella. An experienced technician will be able to evaluate your system and, if your Nest is compatible, install it quick so you can jump right into the savings and convenience.

12. Can I Manually Control My Nest Thermostat?

Nest Thermostats are loaded with innovative features designed to increase comfort and decrease costs. However, you have the ability to turn off the smart features if you prefer manual controls similar to normal thermostats.

Take into account, by doing this you are turning off all of your temperature schedules and allowing the Nest to work like any other thermostat—it will display the temperature and allow changes, but that’s about it.

Setting your thermostat to manual controls can be accomplished with the following steps:

• Auto-Schedule: From the main screen, go to Settings and then scroll to Nest Sense. Go to Auto-Schedule, select No and click Done.
• Eco: From the main screen, go to Settings, scroll to Eco. Once in Eco, select Off for both the current Heat to and Cool to temperatures, before selecting Done.
• Home/Away Assist: From the main screen, go to Settings and select Home/Away Assist. Then, select Stop Using and click Done.
• Reset: After you've cleared the settings, reset your nest. From the main screen, go to Settings and select Reset, highlight Schedule and then select Reset to clear out any saved scheduling data.