Adding Z-Wave to a switched receptacle brings more convenience and energy efficiency to your home. It allows for remote control and automation of any devices you have plugged into the receptacle.
Consider a living room lamp plugged into the outlet. If you make the installation smart, you can turn the lamp on or off using your smartphone or through voice commands with a smart home assistant, eliminating the need to manually operate the wall switch. Additionally, integrating smart functionality allows for automated schedules and routines, like programming the lamp to turn on at sunset and off at bedtime, enhancing home security and saving energy.
However, when looking to replace the standard switch controlling the receptacle, you need to keep in mind that most smart switches are designed for 120V lighting fixtures and are not rated to control receptacles. This creates a bit of a problem, as the National Electrical Code (NEC) mandates a 15A rated switch for a 15A receptacle. Most Zooz wall switches are not rated for 15 A. Fortuntely, we still have great product options to help you make a switched receptacle smart.
Direct Replacement
The ZEN75 Heavy Duty Switch is a 15A rated switch that can be installed to control a switched receptacle with the benefit of matching your other Zooz paddle-style wall switches. Just remember to check that you have access to neutral wire in the switch box. This usually means 2 14-2 romex cables with 2 black wires connected to the switch (one for power, the other to control the receptacle) and 2 white wires bundled in the back of the box (neutrals), not connected to the switch directly. If you just have a single 14-2 romex with black and white wires coming to the box and both are connected to the current switch, you won't be able to use a Zooz switch to control the receptacle electrically. Instead, you would need to go with the "always hot" method covered in the next section of this article.
Please make sure that any appliance connected to the receptacle does not exceed the electrical rating for the ZEN75 switch and is an approved type of load (read the specs here).
Here is the wiring diagram for the Zooz ZEN75 model controlling a switched 15A receptacle:
Alternatively, you can use the ZEN30 Double Switch which is equipped with a dry contact 15A relay that can also do the job. This means you can swap the standard dumb switch and wire the ZEN30 relay to directly control the switched receptacle. If you don't have another load to directly wire to the ZEN30 dimmer paddles, you can use these for scene control to trigger other devices, or you can even program the paddles for more intuitive control of the receptacle, all via Z-Wave. Read more about how to accomplish no load programming here: How to Use Zooz Switches Without a Load.
Please make sure that any appliance connected to the receptacle does not exceed the electrical rating for the ZEN30 switch and is an approved type of load (read the specs here).
Here is the wiring diagram for the Zooz ZEN30 model controlling a switched 15A receptacle:
Always turn the power off at the breaker and make sure all connections are identified correctly on the first try before you attempt the installation. If you're not able to follow the diagrams, we recommend hiring a licensed electrician to help you complete the installation safely. You can also reach out to our team with detailed wiring images and we would be happy to assist! Please review our wiring images guidelines prior to sending any images: How Can I Identify the Wiring For My Zooz Switches?
Make It Hot
Another option is to rewire the receptacle so it's always hot and use a smart plug at the outlet. With this method, you would be changing your switched receptacle into a standard, always powered receptacle. This scenario leaves you with an available switch box, and you can put it to good use! We would recommend installing a Zooz wall switch or Scene Controller in the empty switch box and adding a smart plug like the ZEN04, to the receptacle for Z-Wave control.
While all Zooz switches can technically be installed in a single pole installation without a load, the recommended models are the ZEN71 On/Off Switch, ZEN72 Dimmer, ZEN32 Scene Controller and the ZEN30 Double Switch. These units do not rely on current readings to change and maintain status, and can be used as scene controllers effortlessly.
- You will need a Z-Wave hub that supports central scene functionality to program your switch to control the smart plug using the scene control method or to program Direct Association. Please check if your system has button control built into its interface for our devices first. Here are a few examples of programming using the scene control method on the most popular hubs available:
- Below is a link to our article which details how to program Direct Association, with links to instructions for programming associations on the most popular Z-Wave hubs. Please note that for SmartThings specifically, while a separate child device is created for the relay on the ZEN30 Double Switch, it will not receive a separate node ID to be used in associations, so you cannot program control via Direct Association with the relay. This is a driver limitation; direct association can be programmed on the dimmer only. At this time, the programming can be accomplished through routines instead.
Can I Dim a Switched Receptacle?
As described above, most of our switches cannot be wired to control a switched receptacle, regardless of what you are plugging into the receptacle (even a single lamp). The NEC requires a 15A rated switch for a 15A circuit, and our dimmers are not rated for that.
Instead, we would recommend using the second option to make the receptacle always hot (not switched) and put the lamp plugged in to the outlet on a dimmer plug or equip it with a smart bulb. Once you have the dimmer plug or smart bulb, we would recommend installing any of the switches we recommended before for full remote control.
If you decide to go the smart bulb route, then we recommend installing the ZEN32 Scene Controller in the switch box. With that, you could create presets with your favorite smart bulb settings and trigger them with single or multi-tap button presses on the Scene Controller.
Since you'd be controlling the smart bulb remotely from the switch, we wouldn't recommend putting a dimmer in the wall. Smart bulbs cannot be controlled by another dimmer electrically (this will damage the equipment) and remote dimming wouldn't be as smooth as standard physical dimming.
Real-time remote dimming that we’re used to when using dimmers with regular bulbs is very hard to accomplish with smart bulbs. Since we’re not able to dim smart bulbs electrically (this is true for both smart and regular dimmers since smart bulbs are equipped with their own dimming mechanism), we need to depend on radio commands which are often translated between two different wireless protocols. This causes delays and prevents a good user experience. That's why we recommend finding and saving your favorite smart bulb brightness and color settings to then trigger them with a click from one of the buttons on a ZEN32 Scene Controller.
Questions? Don't hesitate to reach out to our team!
