Last Updated on October 26, 2026 by Umar Farooq
A smart washing machine cannot start a load from your office. You have to be standing at the machine to arm it — laundry in, detergent in, power on, Remote Start held for three seconds — and only then can the phone press go. That one limitation, which the manufacturers document plainly and the marketing never mentions, reframes the entire feature. Connectivity is not remote control of your laundry. It is a notification system with a diagnostic tool attached, and judged as that it is genuinely useful.
This page is about connectivity and nothing else. It does not rank formats or capacities, and if you have not settled whether you want a front-loader or a top-loader first, that is a bigger decision and it lives at front load vs top load washer. What follows is a complete, sourced inventory of what the app actually does, taken from the manufacturers’ own support pages rather than from their product copy.
Disclosure: washerfixlab.com is a participant in the Amazon Associates Program. If you buy through a link on this page we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. We choose products on specification and fit, not on commission, and we say when something is not worth buying.
A smart washing machine cannot start itself
Here is LG’s own documented remote start procedure, in order, from its support library:
- “Put the laundry in the drum and add detergent to the detergent dispenser drawer.” Add softener or bleach now if you are using them.
- “Press the Power button on the washer.”
- “Press and hold the Remote Start button for 3 seconds to enable to the remote control function.”
- “Start a cycle from the LG ThinQ application on your smart phone.”
(LG — top load washer ThinQ features and settings)
Three of those four steps happen with you in the laundry room. And there is a note attached that closes the loophole people immediately look for: “If the door has been opened, you cannot start a cycle remotely.” So you cannot arm it in the morning, open the door to add a forgotten shirt, and start it from the train.
What this actually buys you is a delay you control. Armed before you leave, the machine will wait — LG says that once enabled, “the appliance will wait to start the cycle until it is turned off remotely from the application or this function is disabled.” That is real: it means a load finishes twenty minutes before you walk in rather than sitting wet for six hours, which is the single most useful thing connectivity does for laundry, because wet laundry left in a sealed drum is how front-loaders start to smell. It is also something a 24-hour delay timer on a non-connected machine does almost as well, for nothing.
What the app does when you are standing at the machine
The honest inventory, feature by feature, from LG’s own list. This is the part worth reading before paying for it, because some of it is better than the marketing and some of it is worse.
Cycle-finished notifications. The genuinely good one. A push alert when the cycle ends is worth more than it sounds, for the reason above: laundry that comes out promptly does not develop the smell that gasket maintenance exists to prevent.
Tub Clean Coach. Better than expected. LG’s app “will show you how many cycles have been run since your last tub clean and will allow you to start a tub clean all from within” the app, and LG “recommends a tub clean every 30 cycles or at least once per month.” A counter that nags you about the one maintenance job people skip is a real feature, not a gimmick — and what the cycle does is on washer tub clean cycle explained.
Download Cycle. A programme for a fabric or soil type the machine did not ship with — baby clothes, swimwear, sportswear. Useful once or twice, and with a limit worth knowing: “only one download cycle can be stored at a time. If you choose an alternate cycle to download the existing one will be replaced.” So it is a slot, not a library.
Smart Diagnosis. The most valuable feature on the list and the one nobody buys the machine for. You can run a diagnosis from the app, and “depending on the product you may be able to perform Wi-Fi diagnosis or an audible diagnosis.” On a machine whose control board has failed, a diagnosis that can be read remotely is the difference between one service visit and two.
Energy monitoring and a cycle log. You can see consumption and “a log of the cycles you’ve used in the past”, and tap one to see the settings used. Mildly interesting, briefly. Nobody looks at this in month four.
Favourites, nicknames and rooms. Housekeeping. Six favourite cycles, a nickname per appliance, a room assignment. Convenience, not capability.
Amazon Smart Reorders. Worth naming because it tells you something about the product. Link your Amazon account and “your LG appliance signals to Amazon when supplies are running low so users never run out of essentials.” The app is, among other things, a detergent re-ordering channel. That is not sinister, but it is a feature built for the manufacturer as much as for you, and it belongs in an honest list.
Samsung’s equivalent set runs through SmartThings, and its listings describe the diagnostic half in similar terms — a connected top-loader that “automatically detects and communicates issues through the SmartThings app.”
The 2.4 GHz problem that stops half of these setups
This is where connected appliances actually fail, and it has nothing to do with the washer.
These machines use 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi only. Samsung’s setup guidance requires that you “ensure your router supports 2.4 GHz” and that “both your washing machine and smartphone are connected to the same 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi network” during setup (Samsung — how to connect a washer to SmartThings). LG’s guidance is the same and adds a distance limit: the router should be within about 30 feet of the appliance.
Here is why that matters in 2026. Most modern routers and nearly all mesh systems publish a single network name and steer your phone to 5 GHz or 6 GHz automatically. During setup, your phone needs to be on the 2.4 GHz band at the same time as the washer — and a band-steering router will fight you. The usual fixes are to split the bands temporarily, create a guest 2.4 GHz network, or disable the faster band for five minutes.
There is a second, dumber failure mode in the same guidance: the network name “must be set in English, numbers, or symbols (no special characters)”, and LG says the same about the password. An emoji or an accented character in your SSID will stop this working with no useful error message.
And the location is the real killer. Laundry rooms are frequently in basements, garages and outhouses — the furthest point in the house from the router, often behind a concrete wall. A smart appliance thirty feet away through a foundation wall is an unconnected appliance. Check the signal where the machine will stand, with a phone, before you pay extra for the radio.
What connectivity cannot do for your laundry
Three myths, and the third is the expensive one.
It will not start your washing while you are out. Covered above, documented by the manufacturer, and the single most common misconception about these machines.
It will not stop a leak. This is the one that costs money. A connected washer reports on itself; it does not watch your floor and it does not shut the water off. If flood protection is why you are considering a smart machine, you are buying the wrong product — the devices that actually do that job are a leak sensor and a motorised shutoff valve, and they work on any washer including a thirty-year-old one. That is a separate purchase with its own page at washing machine leak detector, and it is a far better use of the same money.
It will not make the machine wash better. Cycle quality is drum geometry, water, temperature, time and detergent. An app changes none of them. Downloading a “swimwear” cycle is choosing a different combination of the same five variables, not adding a sixth.
One more thing worth being straight about: I am not going to give you a percentage for how many owners stop using the app. It is widely asserted and I could not find a published figure behind it, so it stays as reasoning rather than a statistic. What the reasoning says is this — the features that need you at the machine are the ones people actually use, and the features that work from anywhere are mostly notifications. ENERGY STAR puts US household laundry at “about 300 loads of laundry each year” (ENERGY STAR clothes washers). An app you open twice a week for a notification you could have got from the machine’s own end-of-cycle chime is an app that drifts to the second page of your phone. Judge it on the notification and the diagnosis, and you will not be disappointed.
The connected machines worth shortlisting
Two, because only two of the machines that came back against this query are actually smart washing machines, and padding the list would defeat the point.
LG WM4200HWA, 5.0 cu ft front-loader with SmartThinQ — the model family the documentation above is written for. The connected feature set is the one this page has just inventoried, and the listing summarises it in its own words: SmartThinQ Wi-Fi to “monitor cycles, start or pause remotely, receive notifications”, with Google Assistant and Alexa integration on top. Read that phrase against the first section of this page, because it is exactly the claim that needs qualifying: LG’s support library is the authority over LG’s product copy, and the documented procedure is that remote start must be armed at the machine and is cancelled if the door is opened. What you are actually buying is the notification, the diagnosis and the controlled wait. Beyond the radio it is a serious washer — 5.0 cubic feet, TurboWash 360, Steam Wash and the Allergiene cycle, ENERGY STAR certified — and it is sold and shipped by Amazon rather than a third-party appliance dealer. The numbers to write down before ordering: 27 inches wide, 33.25 deep, 39 tall, 201.5 lb. And the measurement that stops this machine fitting: LG publishes a depth with the door open of up to 55 inches for its 5.0 cubic foot size class, which is far more clear floor than most alcoves have.
Samsung WA44A320KIT1 — a connected HE top-loader and matching dryer, sold as a pair. The important disclosure first: this listing is two appliances, a 4.5 cubic foot HE top-load washer and a 7.4 cubic foot electric dryer, not a washer alone. It runs on SmartThings with Wi-Fi Smart Control for cycle monitoring and alerts, and its best connected feature is the diagnostic one — the listing says it “automatically detects and communicates issues through the SmartThings app, saving time and service calls”, which is the same argument LG’s Smart Diagnosis makes and the most defensible reason to pay for connectivity at all. It ships with the dryer vent, power cable and two water hoses. Honest notes: it is sold by a third-party appliance dealer, and the “12-Month CPS Protection Plan” bundled with it is a third-party protection plan rather than a Samsung warranty extension. If you are replacing both machines and the laundry room has usable Wi-Fi, it is a sensible pair.
What I refused to put on this page, and why it matters. The product search for “smart washing machine” returned, all passing every availability and stock test: a Wi-Fi water leak detector, a Wi-Fi smart water shutoff valve, a three-pack of Wi-Fi moisture sensors, a Wi-Fi countertop dishwasher, and a portable washer with no connectivity at all. Four of those five are good products on their own pages. None of them is a smart washing machine, and putting a leak sensor on this page as though it were would be precisely the bait-and-switch this site exists not to do.
Buying, installing and the connected-machine caveat
Standard appliance warnings apply and are worth repeating: Amazon is a weak channel for full-size washers. Listings move, several are third-party, and most American buyers get these from a big-box retailer or a local dealer. Whoever you use, establish who carries it to the laundry room, whether installation includes hoses, levelling and a test fill, whether the old machine gets disconnected and hauled away, and whether the transit bolts are removed before the first cycle.
One caveat specific to connected machines. Smart features sit on a control board, and a connected board is a more complex board. When one fails, the machine is not partly smart — it is a machine that will not run, and the part is one of the most expensive on it (washing machine control board). That is not an argument against buying one; it is an argument for knowing what you are adding.
Who should buy the dumb version
Anyone whose laundry room has no usable Wi-Fi. A basement, a detached garage, an outhouse, anywhere thirty feet and a concrete wall from the router. Test with a phone before you pay for a radio you cannot use.
Anyone buying it for flood protection. Buy a leak sensor and a shutoff valve instead. They cost a fraction of the price difference, they watch the floor rather than the machine, and they work on whatever washer you already own.
Anyone who wants fewer things to go wrong. A connected control board is more complexity on the component most likely to end the machine. If longevity is the priority, simplicity is the argument, not features.
Anyone who will not install the app. This sounds flippant and it is not. Every connected feature requires an account, an app and a working network. If that is not going to happen in your household, the money is better spent on spin speed.
FAQ
Can you start a smart washing machine from your phone?
Only if you have already armed it at the machine. LG’s documented sequence is laundry in, detergent in, power on, then hold Remote Start for three seconds — and if the door has been opened since, remote start will not work. The phone presses go; it does not load the washer.
What is the most useful feature on a smart washing machine?
Smart Diagnosis, and after it the cycle-finished notification. A diagnosis that can be read through the app can turn two service visits into one, and prompt unloading is what stops a front-loader developing the smell its gasket is famous for.
Why will my washer not connect to Wi-Fi?
Almost always the band. These machines are 2.4 GHz only, and Samsung’s setup guidance requires both the washer and your phone to be on the same 2.4 GHz network — which a band-steering router or mesh system will prevent by default. Special characters in the network name or password are the second cause.
Does a smart washing machine detect leaks?
No. It reports on its own cycles and faults; it does not watch the floor and it cannot shut off the water. That job belongs to a leak sensor and a motorised shutoff valve, which work on any machine of any age.
Is a smart washing machine worth the extra money?
If the laundry room has good Wi-Fi and you value the notification and the diagnostic, yes, modestly. If you are hoping to run laundry remotely, no — the feature does not work that way. And a 24-hour delay timer on a non-connected machine achieves most of the scheduling benefit for nothing.
Do smart washers break more often?
There is no published dataset that would let anyone answer honestly, and anyone giving you a figure is guessing. What is structurally true is that connectivity adds components to the control board, and the control board is among the most expensive parts on the machine.
What happens to the app if the manufacturer drops support?
The machine keeps washing — connectivity is layered on top of a conventional control, not in place of it. What you lose is the notifications, the diagnosis and the cycle download. It is worth treating the smart features as a convenience with an unknown service life rather than as a permanent part of the appliance.
Buy the drum; the app is a bonus
Choose the machine on the things that will still matter in year eight — spin speed, capacity, tub material, whether the pump filter is reachable — and treat connectivity as a tiebreaker between two machines you would otherwise be happy with. That is the correct weighting, and it is the opposite of how these are advertised.
Then, before you pay the premium, do the one test nobody does: stand where the machine will stand and look at your phone’s signal. If it is weak there, you have just saved yourself the cost of the feature. And if flood protection was the real reason you came here, spend the difference on a sensor and a valve — they do the job the app does not.
