The answer — one pick, priced
Get the
Tapo P115 4‑Pack
$56 under your budget
~$6 per metered outlet — the cheapest way to meter four devices in one house, and The Gadgeteer's July 2026 value pick.
Fit ledger — need → measured evidence
■ The catch — co-equal billing, always
No Matter, and no Apple Home. These four plugs answer to Alexa, Google Home and SmartThings only. Anyone in the house who lives in the iPhone Home app or asks Siri simply cannot see them — and no firmware update is coming to fix it.
Dealbreaker? Runner-up №1 is the cheapest 4-pack Siri can address natively ↓
■ Every product has a catch. Verdicts that hide it are how bad buys happen.
Don't buy this if…
- you want smart lighting control (dimming, color, scenes) rather than on/off switchingsmart light bulbs dossier →
- you want smart HVAC/thermostat control rather than plugging in a space heater or portable ACsmart thermostats dossier →
- you need a smart power strip with multiple individually controllable outlets and surge protection
Wrong product for you is still a bad buy. These are the cases where we'd send you somewhere else.
Runners-up — if your needs differ
Adjacent verdicts — other needs, same method
Different budget, different household, different job — each of these is already researched, priced and verified. Take the one that matches your need.
Traps — this verdict avoids
Why the Tapo P115 4-Pack is right for you
It avoids every trap below — and for family of 4, under $80, it is the pick because it delivers:
The wattage ceiling
Every plug here tops out at 15A/1800W — and the Emporia at just 10A continuous (1,200W). Push a space heater past that and the plug trips its safety cutoff. Motor loads (window ACs, compressor dehumidifiers) surge 3-5x their rating at startup and should never go on one.
The radio you don't have
Wi-Fi models join 2.4 GHz networks only — they cannot see a 5 GHz band. The Thread plug (Eve Energy) instead needs a Thread border router — HomePod, Apple TV 4K, Nest Hub Max or SmartThings Station — or it never connects at all.
Matter carries the switch, not the meter
Matter passes on/off between platforms, not kilowatt-hours: energy data is app-only on every metered plug here. Buy one expecting to read watts inside Apple Home, Alexa or Google Home and the numbers are not there.
Provenance — 10 sources, dated
Winners are picked from the full research dossier at knowledgelib.io. Prices, stock and listings are re-verified monthly.