Gadronics Verdict
If you’re all-in on Hue and you want a ceiling light that does more than just flood a room with white, the Datura absolutely delivers on performance and style… albeit it at a helluva price. The dual-zone lighting is smart, the design is slick, and the brightness is impressive, but you can get a whole lot more for a whole lot less from rivals like Lifx and Aqara.
The performance is great, as is the design, but that price is hard to stomach. If you’re all-in on Hue and have cash to splash, go nuts but otherwise look elsewhere.
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Super bright output -
Dual-zone lighting control -
Premium build and finish -
Smooth smart home integrations
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Expensive -
No Hue effects support -
Heavy
Philips Hue Datura Ceiling Light: Introduction
- Lighting type: Smart flush-mount ceiling light
- Connectivity: Zigbee, Bluetooth
- Ecosystems: Matter, Alexa, Apple Home, Google Home, SmartThings, Homey, more…
With its sleek floating profile, dual-zone illumination, and Hue ecosystem support, the Philips Hue Datura has a lot going for it, at least on paper.
It’s a great-looking, impressively bright ceiling light that’s also absurdly expensive for what it is.
You’ve got two size options for the round version: a 38.4cm version that retails at $329.99 / £299.99 and a whopper 57.4cm model at $439.99 / £399.99. It’s the latter that I’ve got on test for this review.
That price is quite a lot higher than either version of the older Hue Surimu panel, which the Datura is essentially replacing, but while the Datura adds some genuinely smart touches, they don’t quite justify the price hike.
Especially not when you consider you can get a similar design, and more advanced features, at a fraction of the price with the likes of the Aqara Ceiling Light T1M or the Lifx SuperColor Ceiling light.
However, take the price out of the equation and there’s a lot to love about the Datura. Read on for my full review.
Design and installation
I’ve given the Datura a good kicking in the intro, comparing it to the Aqara and Lifx rivals, but I will come to its defence straight away here for the design. When it’s not powered on, you can see it’s a much more premium bit of kit, in terms of materials and finishes.
The Datura skips the cheap plasticy frame in favour of a cleaner, more minimalist finish. It floats slightly below the ceiling on a spring-loaded mount, which isn’t just a design flourish; it’s essential for the ring of upward-facing ambient LEDs around the perimeter to do their thing.
The build quality is great, and it feels expensive (and it is, did I mention that?)
The aluminium body gives it a real solid feeling, but beware that also comes with the caveat that it’s heavy. The manual suggests a couple of screws for the smaller version and three for the bigger when it comes to holding the mount in place – but make sure you find appropriate wall plugs for whatever your ceiling is made of.
The big boy on review here weighs in at over 6.2kg.
The mounting process is similar to other flush-mount Hue panels, and those rivals already mentioned.
You simply have to screw in the bracket, wire up the light (it supports two-wire systems in the UK), and clip on the body.
There are a couple of metal cables on the body to clip it to the frame during installation, to make wiring it up easier and to stop it smacking you in the face mid-install.
It’s very doable solo if you’re strong enough to lift it; I had mine up and running in less than 15 minutes.
Brightness and performance
The Datura is very bright. The smaller model pushes out up to 3,300 lumens at 4000K; the larger one hits a massive 5,390 lumens, enough to light up rooms well beyond your average 10–15m² bedroom. That makes it one of the most powerful Hue ceiling lights you can buy, outshining the Surimu panel by around 30%.
It’s not just about sheer output, though. The big sell here is the dual lighting zones: the main downward-facing panel and that upward-firing ambient ring.
You can control each separately to create scenes, think cool white downlight with a warm glow halo, or colour effects that subtly bounce off the ceiling for moodier vibes.
Like the Aqara T1M, these two lights are independently addressable not only in the Hue app, but also with smart home systems too, meaning not only can you create some cool effects, but you could also use that outer ring for automations through the likes of Alexa and HomeKit.
Think having that secondary light glow amber if the doorbell rings, or shine red if the smoke alarm is triggered.
There’s full White and Color Ambiance support (16 million colours, colour temps from 2000K to 6500K), and while it doesn’t match the CRI of a high-end dedicated fixture, colour rendering is solid.
It doesn’t support Hue’s newer Multi-Source Light (MSL) tech and you can’t tap into effects in the Hue app either. So while the color options and performance are fantastic, you can’t create the lightshows that you can with much cheaper rivals.
App control and integration
The easiest way is to simply pair to the Hue app using Bluetooth. This gets the Datura showing up in the Hue app with a pretty comprehensive feature set.
However, for full functionality and the complete set of Hue bells and whistles such as scenes, automations and more, you’ll want to pair the Datura with a Hue Bridge.
You can also connect Hue bulbs directly to some Amazon smart speakers using Zigbee. The likes of the 3rd-gen Echo Show 8, Echo Hub and Echo Studio can work as Zigbee hubs so, if you’ve already got one of these, the Hue Datura can be added through Alexa without the need for the Philips Hue skill.
I used the traditional Bridge mode and added the Datura to my existing Hue system and it was super simple to get them – the two lights are added as individual devices – synced up with specific zones and rooms.
This gave me easy access to change the colors and brightness of the bulbs and mess around with the white temperature.
Once the Datura is added added, you can control each bulb’s brightness and colour separately, create routines, and link it with other smart home devices, just as you would any other Hue smart light.
Philips Hue guides
It works with Alexa, Google Home, Apple Home, SmartThings, Homey and a whole array of others, with Matter compatibility through a paired Bridge also on offer.
Smart switches, such as the Hue Smart Button also work well with the Datura, especially if you don’t want to fiddle with the app every time.
Final thoughts
The Datura is a ceiling light that looks great, shines bright, and plays nicely with your smart home setup, but that price tag is hard to justify when rivals are offering similar (or better) features for far less.
If you’re deep in the Hue ecosystem and want the best-looking panel light they’ve made, this is it. If not, there are better-value options waiting to light up your life.
How we test
When we publish our reviews, you can rest assured that they are the result of “living with” long term tests.
Smart lights usually live within an ecosystem, or a range of products that – supposedly – all work in harmony. Therefore, it’s impossible to use a connected light for a week and deliver a verdict.
Because we’re testing smart home kit all day, everyday, we know what matters and how a particular light compares to alternatives that you might also be considering.
Our reviews are comprehensive, objective and fair and, of course, we are never paid directly to review a device.
Read our guide on how we test smart lights to learn more.
