Happy couple moving home resting and talking
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Moving to a new home is a stressful time in anyone’s life. Fortunately, modern technology is here to make the other aspects of it a little more convenient and enjoyable. If you know someone who just moved house, or are moving home soon, why not surprise them with one of the best tech housewarming gifts?
Everyone they know will be buying them candles, crackers, wine, cheeses, and house plants. That’s all lovely, but a bit cliche and dull. If you want to surprise, delight, and offer something that will last through a couple of meal times, a techy housewarming gift is a great way to do it. Here are some of the best tech housewarming gifts you can buy today.
Tea and Noodles In Minutes
Bella Pro Series Electric Kettle
Moving house often means not having access to all your most important appliances and gadgets right away and fiddling with new ones that came pre-installed. A good quality electric kettle can be a lifesaver in these situations, giving your loved ones the option of a hot cup of tea (green, black, or white) or a steaming bowl of noodles in just a couple of minutes.
This model from the Bella Pro series comes with several key settings for making the perfect cup of tea, no matter the preference, and it can even keep a pot warm should your loved ones not drink it right away. When it’s time to do another day of unpacking, your friends will love their quick access to caffeine with an electric kettle.
Protect The Property And The People In It
Google Nest Protect 2nd Generation
Smoke alarms aren’t a fun part of protecting your home, but they are an immensely important one. Modern options provide much more than their traditional dumb counterparts, too. The Google Nest Protect second edition can detect both smoke and carbon monoxide, periodically tests itself, and can connect to a smartphone — great for turning it off if someone just burnt the toast.
As with most other smart devices, the Nest Protect has its own smart app for nuanced mobile control, and its built-in voice alert system can give a gentler warning just before it begins to blare. It can even link up with the rest of a Nest home network, helping to warn the owners in different rooms of the house if it detects smoke elsewhere.
Get Gaming Right Away
Oculus Quest 2
The Oculus Quest 2 makes virtual reality easier than ever thanks to its inside out tracking and onboard processing. If your loved one hasn’t had the chance to unpack their gaming PC or console, this will let them play in whatever space they have available.
VR is also a great communication medium. If they’ve moved far and you miss them, a Quest 2 will let you exist in the same virtual space or experience 3D video calling in a way that makes you feel almost as close as being there with them in person. It’s an extravagant gift, but a wonderful one that will be much loved for years to come.
Fun Way to Eradicate Pests
Bug-a-salt Salt Gun
If your loved one moves to an area with nearby wetlands and finds themselves inundated with wasps or hornets as soon as they begin to unpack, there are a myriad of ways to keep the pests at bay. The most fun way, though, is with the Bug-a-salt salt gun. It takes regular table salt, and fires a shotgun blast of moisture sucking granules at the critters.
It’s effective at up to a metre away, is non-toxic, and doesn’t require any batteries. A single load of table salt is good for around 50 shots, and all you need to do to ready it is pull the cocking mechanism. For those with pets and younger children, it includes a built-in safety catch and has a cock that’s designed to be difficult for children to engage.
Who Needs a TV?
PVO Mini Projector
While your friends wait for their TV to arrive or for someone big and strong to mount one on the wall for them, help them stay up to date with all their favorite shows with this housewarming gift idea. A mini projector is compact, convenient, and can give a great picture in a dark room no matter where it’s shone.
This PVO projector is compatible with a wide range of inputs, from smartphones to DVD players, laptops, or gaming consoles. Connect it to streaming stick like a Chromecast or Apple TV and your friends can even cast their phone to it. It’s an affordable, easy way to enjoy TV and movies without having to setup a big screen TV, making this one of the best housewarming gifts you can buy.
Gardening at its Easiest
Indoor Hydroponics Herb Grower
Whether your friends or family are moving into an expansive house or a cozy apartment, everyone has space for a small hydroponics garden. This smart indoor herb garden is a great housewarming gift idea for those who want a green thumb that never gets dirty.
As a self-contained hydroponic system, this herb garden has no soil mess, and no watering required. The LED lights mean you can put it just about anywhere with a power source and it will grow — no sunlight necessary. The lights are on an adjustable height-stand too, so as the plants or herbs grow, it’s easy to raise it up to make room for more and bigger plants.
Jazz Up Any Room With Fancy Lighting
Nanoleaf Canvas
There’s no better time to explore funky lighting options than when you’re first moving into a new home. While your loved ones are unpacking, you can hit them with one of the best housewarming gifts: a Nanoleaf Canvas lighting array. A pioneer in custom RGB lighting, Nanoleaf creates some of the most exciting alternative lighting arrays out there, and the Canvas Starter Kit might be its best yet.
With nine light panels to arrange, customize, and link up with their smartphone, your friends will love turning their new living room, bedroom, kitchen, or any other room into a funky light show with the companion app. It can be made volume sensitive to bounce in time to music, or touch reactive so kids can have a blast tapping away to create all sorts of beautiful patterns.
Let Pets Explore the New Garden Without Fear
Whistle Go GPS Tracking Collar
Moving to a new house is exciting, but for pet owners, it can be terrifying. Without knowing the ins and outs of a new yard, letting a furry friend run free presents a lot of potential problems. A GPS collar is a great housewarming gift idea, because it means that no matter what little hole their pet wriggles through, they’ll be able to easily find it again.
The Whistle Go is a compact collar with powerful GPS tracking that sends real time notifications and live tracking updates right to the owner’s phone. It also includes step tracking and basic health information abut the animal, and has a battery that will last days at a time so it doesn’t need constant charging.
Help Keep the New Pad Clean
iRobot Roomba e5
Whether you want to help tidy up after the previous owners, or help the new ones keep it that way, a robot vacuum cleaner like the iRobot Roomba e5 is one of the best housewarming gifts you can buy. It’s compact, autonomous, and does a decent job of cleaning all kinds of floors, from carpet to hardwoods and laminate.
The smart app and sensors help the Roomba adjust to your friends’ schedule, so it can clean up after everyone’s gone to bed or when they’re at work. It can also learn habits and target the messier parts of a new home, making sure that the floors remain dust and dirt free—even when there’s excessive pet hair to deal with.
Stay In Touch With Friends and Digitally Greet Couriers
Ring Video Doorbell and Echo Show Bundle
Help your newly moved friends or family stay in touch that bit more easily with the Echo Show, a smart speaker with a built in screen that lets you dial other Alexa-equipped devices for quick and convenient video calls. It’s also a handy device to have around for reading recipes, watching videos or listening to music.
It works really well with the bundled Ring video doorbell too, as you can stream straight from the doorbell, making it easy to see who’s at the door. Whether chatting to a courier about dropping off your package or welcoming friends with your voice before you make your way to the door, this combo will add convenience and another level of safety to any home.
