Being a new parent is daunting, but smart technologies can make it less frightening. As parents ourselves, we’re always finding new child-rearing ideas that can be helpful. With the world evolving at a rapid pace, it’s no surprise to see the rise of the smart nursery; an idea designed to give parents a greater insight into their baby’s health and wellbeing.

So, what does the smart nursery look like?

Adaptive environments

Creating an environment with optimal lighting and music for routine stimulation is an area of the smart nursery, and more broadly, the smart home, that we’ll see grow significantly in the next few years. “Smart lightbulbs”, for example, allow you to manage your child’s lights from anywhere in the world with the touch of the mobile app. They can help to save energy, with the ability to set timers that can assist as part of a sleep training plan. Climate sensors also give the ability to monitor the temperature and humidity levels, while noise solutions can help to play music and stories to entertain bub or offer white noise to block out house sounds that may wake your baby.

Sensory tech

Sensory tech encompasses audio wearables, nursery sensors and health sensing technology. Sensors will play a key role in the smart nursery as Artificial Intelligence (AI) becomes more accessible and parents have more than instinct to count on. As the name implies; audio wearables let parents hear their baby through tech that is attached to the baby’s clothing. This ensures they can hear if bub sounds content during times when they need to be alone, like nap time.

Nursery sensors can be used to track who is entering and leaving a child’s nursery. These are particularly useful during the transition time when your child is going from crib to bed as it can alert you to their activity. They can even be customised to allow a light to turn on in the hallway if movement is detected.

Perhaps most important is health sensing tech. These products allow you to know your baby is okay by giving you valuable insight beyond the surface of how they simply look or sound. Within the field of smart nursery tech are things like heart rate and breathing monitors. Our Smart Sock is one of these. It uses pulse oximetry – many know of this as little light they put on your finger in hospital – to show bub’s heart rate and oxygen saturation levels in real time. It also notifies you if the levels fall outside the predetermined range.

Health sensors provide a more thorough way to track your baby’s well-being and can help you, as a parent to sleep better. Many of these products are connected to an app that proactively communicates how your baby is sleeping. Additional app packages can also be added, to give you access to historical data to help you identify sleep trends and potential irregularities, which can be discussed further with your paediatrician or local medical professional.

Have you seen another area of the smart nursery that you’d like to know more about? Let us know on Facebook.