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The Problem That’s Driving Smart Home Users Crazy
I’ve been tracking this issue closely, and it’s honestly heartbreaking to see how many people are affected. Your Wemo devices worked perfectly yesterday. Today? They’re all showing “offline” in Google Home.
This isn’t just you. Thousands of users are dealing with the same nightmare right now. The problem started hitting people hard about a month ago, and it’s getting worse.
What’s Actually Happening Behind the Scenes
Here’s what I’ve discovered from digging into this mess. Google Home and Wemo’s servers aren’t talking to each other properly. It’s like they’re speaking different languages suddenly.
Your Wemo app shows everything working fine. But Google Home? It acts like your devices don’t exist. Voice commands through Google Assistant either fail completely or work but then complain they “can’t reach Wemo”.
The most frustrating part? Some users can still control devices with voice commands on Google Nest Hubs, even though the app shows them offline. Google is literally turning your lights on while telling you it can’t reach them. Makes no sense.
The Troubleshooting Trap That Makes Things Worse
I need to warn you about something critical. Google’s official support keeps telling people to unlink and relink their Wemo accounts. Don’t do this right now.
Here’s why this advice is dangerous:
- Users who unlink get the error “Could not reach Wemo. Please try again”
- Once you unlink, you can’t get back in
- You lose voice control completely
- Multiple users report being “bricked” after following this advice
One user put it perfectly: “Your instructions all sound wonderful except for the fact that now that I disconnected WeMo from my Google Home app, Google Home won’t let it re-connect”.
What I’ve Tried (And What Actually Works)
I’ve been testing different approaches. Here’s what I found:
These steps don’t work:
- Clearing app caches
- Reinstalling Google Home app
- Changing browsers
- Factory resetting Wemo devices
- Power cycling routers
What might still work:
- Keep devices that show “offline” but don’t unlink them
- Use voice commands through Google Nest Hubs
- Switch to Alexa temporarily
- Control devices directly through Wemo app
The Real Story From Google’s Side
Google finally acknowledged this as a bug. A Platinum Product Expert confirmed the “Google Team took this as a bug” and they’re “in search of a fix”.
But here’s what concerns me. This problem has been going on for over a month. Some users report issues dating back weeks. Google’s response has been slow and their troubleshooting advice actually makes things worse.
My Honest Assessment of the Situation
This is a server-side integration problem between Google and Belkin. The APIs aren’t communicating properly. It’s not your network, your devices, or your setup.
Google’s support team doesn’t seem to understand the severity. They keep giving generic troubleshooting steps that don’t work. Meanwhile, users are losing functionality they paid for.
What You Should Do Right Now
Based on everything I’ve learned, here’s my advice:
- Don’t unlink your Wemo account – You’ll lose everything
- Keep using voice commands – They often still work even when app shows offline
- Use the Wemo app directly – It still controls your devices fine
- Consider Alexa temporarily – It’s not affected by this bug
- Send feedback to Google – They need details to fix this
This is Google’s problem to fix, not yours. The integration between Google Home and Wemo’s services broke, and Google needs to repair it.
Don’t let support agents convince you to factory reset devices or unlink accounts. Those steps won’t help and might make things worse.
Your devices aren’t broken. The connection between two big companies is broken. That’s a very different problem, and it requires a very different solution.
I’ll keep monitoring this situation. But for now, work around it instead of trying to fix it. The fix has to come from Google’s engineering team.