In late 2025, Google officially discontinued cloud support for the 1st and 2nd generation Nest thermostats. This change affects thousands of households across the UK — especially homeowners who rely on the Nest app for remote heating control. If your Nest thermostat suddenly stopped working as a “smart” device, this guide explains:
- What exactly happened
- What it means for your home
- What reliable alternatives are there to replace Google’s Nest?
Let’s break it down in a simple, practical way. What exactly happened? Why did Nest 1st/2nd gen stop working? Google has phased out cloud services for older Nest thermostat generations. This means:
- The Nest app can no longer control your thermostat
- Remote heating on/off no longer works
- Schedules, geofencing and automations stop functioning
- Integration with other smart-home platforms becomes unreliable or disabled
Your thermostat still works on the wall — but it now behaves like a basic manual controller.
What exactly happened?
"Your thermostat will no longer connect to or work in the Google Nest app or Google Home app starting on October 25, 2025." This is Google’s official announcement — and yes, they couldn’t even be bothered to give a reason. But generally speaking, the reasons include:
- ageing hardware
- increased maintenance costs
- changes to Google’s cloud infrastructure
- an ecosystem shift towards newer Nest models
Unofficially, it’s similar to what many tech companies do: legacy devices are gradually retired to push users towards newer products.
What it means for your home?
If you depended on the Nest app, here’s what you’re experiencing now:
- ❌ You can’t adjust the temperature when away from home
- ❌ No more heating schedules or automation
- ❌ No geofencing (“heat when I’m coming home”)
- ❌ No holiday mode
- ❌ No smart-home integration
- ❌ No energy-usage insights
- ❌ Reduced comfort and less efficient heating
In other words: your “smart” thermostat is no longer smart. Do you have to replace your Nest thermostat? Technically, you can keep using it — as a purely manual device.
What reliable alternatives are there to replace Google’s Nest?
To be fair, as one of the earliest smart thermostats, the Nest did have a groundbreaking moment. But a decade has passed, and smart heating is no longer a game only the big tech giants can play.
(And frankly, Google’s latest move isn’t exactly what you’d expect from a “big tech giant,” either.)
You can consider alternatives such as Hive, Tado or Repenic. They offer similar compatibility and functionality to Nest — meaning that if your home currently works with a Nest thermostat, you can replace it directly with any of these brands.
To make your decision easier, we’ve put together a comparison table showing the key features across different brands:
| Tado | Hive | Repenic | |
| Price | ￡129.99 | ￡189 | ￡99 |
| Protocol | Matter | Zigbee 3.0 | WiFi |
| Hub required | Yes (border router) | Yes | No |
| Power | 3 x AAA batteries | 4 x AA batteries | 2 x AA batteries |
| Battery life | 1 year | 1 year | 1 year |
| Heating program | √ | √ | √ |
| Hot water program | √ | √ | √ |
| Heating BOOST | X | √ | √ |
| Hot water BOOST | X | √ | √ |
| Opentherm | X (UK version) | √ | √ |
| Frost protection | √ | √ | √ |
|
Multi-zone heat
|
√ (separate receiver is required) | √ (separate receiver is required) | √ |
|
Voice control
|
√ | √ | √ |
| Away mode | √ | √(￡3.99/month) | √ |
|
Open window detection
|
√(￡3.99/month) | √(an separate sensor is required) | √ |
| Geofence | √(￡3.99/month) | √ | X |
| Adaptive heating | √(￡3.99/month) | X | √ |
|
Subscription fees
|
￡3.99/month | ￡3.99/month | No any extral fees |
Other details you might care about
1. Older tado° thermostats supported OpenTherm, but the versions sold in the UK did not — a topic that was widely discussed on tado°’s user forum at the time. Whether the new models support OpenTherm in the UK has not yet been confirmed by users, especially since tado° closed its community forum in the summer of 2025.
2. In terms of smart-function experience, tado° appears to have some issues in certain areas, if you have similar requirements to the mentioned in the screenshot below, it’s best to check with tado°’s official support team before purchasing to confirm whether this review is accurate:
（*This review is taken from tado°’s official UK store on Amazon.）
3 .By comparison, Hive — as a UK-based brand — doesn’t seem to have any major drawbacks. While it does offer an optional subscription for its app, the non-subscription version is more than sufficient for everyday use. However, in multi-zone heating systems you will need to purchase additional thermostats and receivers, which can make the overall cost quite high.
4. Repenic is a more economical option. While it does have a few limitations — for example, it doesn’t offer geofencing — its feature set is still more than sufficient for most everyday scenarios. For 3-zone or 4-zone heating systems, Repenic can save you even more, as no additional receivers are required. We believe a thermostat should help you save energy, not charge you extra for it, which is why we don’t offer subscription-based app features and why our receiver is designed to support 1–4 zones out of the box.
Yes, this is technically an advert-style blog — but if you’re looking for beautifully designed products and a more economical heating-control solution, it might be worth giving us a try. And if you’re worried about quality, you don’t need to be: we offer a 5-year warranty.
Nest? Just 2 years.
Check Repenic thermostat here:
