Philips Hue Lightstrip Plus: flexible smart lighting for living rooms and gaming setups

Responsible: ad hoc news Lifestyle & Consumer Desk. Reviewed prior to publication on June 12, 2026 at 6:06:29 PM ET. Details in the imprint.

The Philips Hue Lightstrip Plus is one of the most recognizable smart LED strip products in Signify N.V.'s consumer portfolio, designed to add color-changing, app-controlled light to furniture, entertainment setups, and architectural details in the home. With millions of colors, adjustable white tones, and support for multiple smart home platforms, the Lightstrip Plus is positioned as a flexible way to upgrade living rooms, kitchens, and gaming rooms without rewiring the house. In the US market, the standard 80-inch base kit typically sells around $80 to $90 depending on retailer and promotions, and it can be extended with additional 40-inch segments up to a specified maximum length. For shoppers comparing smart lighting options, this strip stands out because it combines physical flexibility, strong ecosystem support, and long product support from a large, established lighting manufacturer.

What the Philips Hue Lightstrip Plus does in everyday use

The Philips Hue Lightstrip Plus is a flexible LED strip with a self-adhesive backing that can be mounted under cabinets, behind TVs, along shelves, or inside coves to create indirect ambient lighting. According to Signify's product documentation, the latest Lightstrip Plus version supports a wide range of color and white temperatures, allowing users to choose from millions of colors as well as warm to cool white light. The strip connects to power via an included adapter and communicates with the Hue ecosystem over Zigbee or Bluetooth depending on the kit version, which means it can be paired directly with a smartphone via Bluetooth or integrated into a broader smart home setup via a Philips Hue Bridge. This dual connectivity approach gives new users a simple entry point while still offering advanced automation when a Bridge is present.

Once installed, users control the Lightstrip Plus using the Philips Hue app, voice assistants, or compatible smart home platforms such as Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant, and Apple Home through Hue's ecosystem integrations. Within the Hue app, owners can assign the strip to rooms or zones, schedule on and off times, and apply preconfigured scenes that coordinate colors and brightness with other Hue bulbs and fixtures. For example, the strip can run a warm, dimmed "TV time" scene behind a media console in the evening, then switch to bright, cool white for cleaning or focused tasks. Because the strip uses LEDs, power consumption is significantly lower than traditional incandescent solutions, and Signify specifies long life hours for its Hue products, reducing the frequency of replacements compared with non-LED strips.

For entertainment setups, the Lightstrip Plus can be paired with Philips Hue Sync on a PC or with a Hue HDMI Sync Box for consoles to mirror on-screen content, creating a more immersive visual experience. When combined with other Hue color-capable bulbs, this allows the entire room to respond to movies, games, or music in real time, an application that has become a key use case highlighted by both Signify and third-party reviewers. In addition, the strip can be cut at designated points marked on the product, giving homeowners flexibility to fit it to furniture or cabinet runs without leaving extra dangling segments. Cut segments are not universally rejoinable without specific connector accessories, so Signify emphasizes planning the layout before trimming, particularly for built-in or permanent installations.

In the kitchen, users often mount the Lightstrip Plus under wall cabinets for counter task lighting, benefiting from the ability to shift from bright neutral white when cooking to softer tones during evening hours. Reviews from US-based tech and home publications generally note that brightness is strong enough for accent and moderate task lighting, though it may not fully replace dedicated high-output task fixtures on its own. In bedrooms, some users install the strip under beds or behind headboards to create indirect lighting that reduces glare while providing enough illumination for walking or reading when combined with other Hue lamps. Integration with motion sensors in the Hue ecosystem means the strip can gently turn on at low brightness for late-night trips without disturbing others as much as a ceiling light would.

From a technical perspective, the Lightstrip Plus is designed to be extended up to a maximum total length specified by Signify, typically around 10 meters for earlier generations, using matching extension kits that plug into the main strip. Staying within the rated maximum length is important to maintain consistent brightness and avoid overloading the power supply. The strip is generally rated for indoor use, with specific IP ratings indicating resistance to dust and limited moisture; users planning installations in bathrooms or near sinks need to check the exact variant and its rating. While there are outdoor-rated Hue lightstrips in the portfolio, these are separate products with different protective casings, and the indoor Lightstrip Plus is not meant to replace them in exposed conditions.

Because it is part of the Philips Hue ecosystem, the Lightstrip Plus gains features over time through firmware updates delivered via the Hue Bridge. Signify has historically rolled out enhancements such as new scenes, improved color rendering, and compatibility with emerging standards like Matter across supported devices, and the Lightstrip Plus is among the products benefiting from this ecosystem investment. For US households already using Hue bulbs and fixtures, adding a Lightstrip Plus typically requires only plugging in the strip, placing it in the app, and assigning it to an existing room or zone. For newcomers, starting with a Bluetooth-compatible starter kit offers a lower upfront commitment, with the option to add a Hue Bridge later if they want automations that work when the phone is away or turned off.

For Signify N.V., Philips Hue is a central consumer-facing smart lighting brand, and the Lightstrip Plus serves as a versatile product that helps extend Hue into entertainment, furniture, and architectural lighting applications. This strip acts as a bridge product linking core bulb-based lighting to decorative and ambiance-focused uses, broadening the reasons for households to stay within the Hue ecosystem instead of mixing multiple brands. Shares of Signify N.V. (NL0011821392, ticker LIGHT) traded at $21.34 on Euronext Amsterdam on June 11, 2026.

This article was created with a.i. assistance and editorially reviewed. Product information is provided without warranty; prices and availability may change at any time. Not investment advice, not a buy or sell recommendation. Trading in securities carries risks up to the total loss of capital.