Flic Twist Review

Introduction

Flic’s buttons are the perfect way to connect a physical control to your smart home devices, simplifying their use. The Flic Twist is a more sophisticated option, adding a rotating ring and white indicators, allowing you to manage multiple devices and have more granular control over each. Its applications are limited only by your imagination – it’s almost literally one ring to rule them all.

While Flic buttons can be linked with a Bluetooth smartphone or laptop, the Flic Twist requires a Flic hub – although you can buy it without if you already have one. There’s a choice of two: the Flic Hub LR is ideal for more advanced or demanding applications, and offers wired Ethernet, audio outputs, Homekit support and the IR blaster. If you can do without those features, the cheaper Hub Mini should be fine.

Design and Features

• Good looking, available in black or white
• Works with Alexa, Matter, and a huge range of others
• Requires a hub

Shortcut Labs’ Flic Twist is significantly bigger than a Flic button – about the diameter of a drinks can – and it’s powered by two supplied AAA batteries which should last for around two years. It’s magnetic, so it’ll stick to the side of many noticeboards and fridges. It also comes with a mounting sticker, or you can fix it in place with a screw. At the front there’s a single button, surrounded by 12 white LEDs and a rotating outer ring. It looks great, and you can choose between white and black designs, or the limited edition white and black example seen here.

This controller’s ring adds an extra dimension to the standard Flic buttons, which let you assign an action to a physical push, double-push or hold. With the Twist you get push and double-push, but also twist and push-twist, which replaces hold. This twist control opens up a huge range of options, from setting the precise level of a light or the volume of music, to selecting between multiple scenes or devices before applying a change.

Like other Flic controllers, the Twist comes with a set of stickers that help users understand what it does. On Flic buttons there’s room for only a single sticker, but here there are many smaller stickers – you might need lots of them, as I’ll explain soon.

Flic’s hubs link up with a simply huge number of other systems. There’s direct integration with Alexa, Sonos, SmartThings, IFTTT, Philips Hue, LIFX and IKEA Dirigera/Trådfri, to name just some. Perhaps most significantly the list also includes Matter, which in turn lets you link to devices from more than 300 manufacturers – I’m not aware of a smart home device offering wider compatibility.

There is one important exception, however. Google Home doesn’t yet allow its automations to be triggered by third-party sensors or buttons, so you can’t use Flic controllers to start a routine. There’s nothing Shortcut Labs can do about that, unfortunately, but it is a pain if you’re already using Home to automate your lights and other devices. 

Configuration

• Easy to connect
• Daunting range of possibilities

I tested the Flic Twist using the Flic Hub Mini, which is a tiny circular device powered over USB-C. This acts as a bridge between your Flic controllers – which use Bluetooth 5 Low Energy – and your wireless network. It’s easy to get started; you simply install the Flic app, connect to the hub via Bluetooth, and add it to your Wi-Fi. Oddly, you’ll always connect to the hub using Bluetooth, even once it’s on your network.

The next step is to add your Flic controllers, which is as simple as long-pressing each button until the hub picks it up. Once added, you can begin the fun part of assigning smart operations to specific actions on each controller. This is a two-stage process where you first select the ecosystem you want to control, such as Philips Hue, then the scene or command that you want the action to set – in some cases you need to do this part in the target ecosystem’s app.

This is simple with Flic buttons. For example, I’ve set one up by my front door which tells Alexa to turn on the ground floor lights with one push, and the first floor lights with a double-push – perfect for when we come home at night. Holding the same button as I go out turns off all my smart devices.

Things are much, much more configurable with the Flic Twist. At its most basic level, you can assign push and double-push actions to its central button, supporting a similar scenario to the above. What you do with the twist, however, is limited more by your own imagination.

That’s because the twisting action can be used in several different ways. Most straightforwardly you can assign a twist to a single device. For example, if you have a smart bulb, you could configure it so that twisting the controller instantly adjusts its brightness. Further, you could set up the push-twist action to change its colour or colour temperature. You might pair this with push/double-push control of a smart socket, giving you a single physical device to control the smart devices in a room.

That’s a simple configuration. But what if you’ve got multiple dimmable devices in the room? Here you could use Advanced Dimming, which lets you add up to three bulbs, and dim them all in sequence. That might be useful in a lounge/diner where you want to dim the lights above the kitchen, then the table, then finally the TV as the evening progresses. Again, having the choice of twist and push-twist actions means you could set this up to control two groups of devices, or even the same ones in different ways.

The next way to use twist or push-twist actions is via the scene blender. This lets you assign up to four preconfigured scenes to the 12, 3, 6 and 9 o’clock positions on the dial, and rotate it to select them. If you like – and if the target ecosystem supports it – you can have the devices fade between each point. To illustrate, the Shortcut Labs website gives the example of a room with smart lighting that can be blended between daytime, dinner, party, and cozy scenes.

Note that if you want, each scene in the blender can comprise multiple devices, actions or groups from multiple smart systems. You could, for example, create a single scene that changes the colour and brightness of several Matter-compatible bulbs, triggers an Alexa routine, and starts Spotify or Sonos playback.

As if that’s not enough, The Flic Twist also offers Selector mode, which works with push-twisting only, and gives you the most far-ranging control. Here you can assign scenes, routines or individual devices to all but the top position of the dial, and push-twist the ring to select which of up to 11 devices or groups you want to control. There’s a basic mode in which this is limited to a more manageable three options. For each device or scene you assign, you can define push, double-push and twist actions.

As an example, you could assign a Sonos device to the first position, a dimmable bulb to the second, a motorised window blind to the third, a room thermostat to the fourth, and so on. Push-twisting the dial to 1 o’clock would select the Sonos, after which you might use a push to start playback, a double-push to skip a track, and a twist to control volume. Selecting 2 o’clock might let you turn the bulb on and off or control its brightness, while selecting 3 or 4 o’clock would give you control over the blind or heating.

This is a mighty powerful way of controlling a large number of smart devices, groups and scenes from a single interface, but it could also become almighty complex. In the most advanced scenarios you might have a Flic Twist where push-twisting to activate selector mode lets you choose from 11 items, each with up to three subsequent commands. Twisting the same controller might also control four scenes in Scene Blender, while pushing or double-pushing the central button could issue further commands. That’s a lot for users to remember, even if you liberally peppered the Twist and surrounding wall with stickers and notes.

Performance

• Strong Bluetooth connection
• Works almost instantly
• Can be confusing

I tested the Flic Twist by sending commands to Alexa, a Matter-enabled light switch, and a Matter-enabled smart light bulb. With all three – and especially with Matter – the responses to button presses and twists of the rotary controller were near-instant. That’s particularly important when you’re making adjustments to lighting, volume or other levels, where a lag could cause you to accidentally overshoot the level you were trying to set. It also means that you’ll know quickly if your commands haven’t worked for any reason.

This did happen a couple of times during my testing of the Twist. While I never got unexpected or unwanted results, once or twice nothing happened the first time I tried a command. I found that by the time I’d realised it hadn’t worked, trying again would be successful. I’m not blaming Flic for this – smart integrations involve different systems talking to each other, and occasionally the process fails.

Just as when we previously reviewed the Flic hub and its updated buttons, I had no problems with the Bluetooth connection between the hub and Flic Twist. Even two storeys above the hub, separated by a concrete floor, the Twist’s commands got through straight away. The controller also seems robust, surviving an accidental drop onto a hard tile floor, but I didn’t love the slightly imprecise feel to the way it rotated.

There’s no doubt the Flic Twist is a brilliant addition for smart home enthusiasts, but while it is simple and intuitive in its most basic configurations, its power also gives it the potential to become confusing.

After realising my family was baffled by the various apps and devices in our home, I managed to simplify several routines using Flic buttons, which everyone now uses. My young son cheerfully used the Flic Twist to control a smart bulb in his room, but nobody took to a more advanced arrangement in which I’d set up the Selector to control a group of routines. My partner preferred voice control, or even doing things manually in the relevant apps.

Should you buy it?