Smart sous vide cooker to start charging $2/month for 10-year-old companion app
Smart sous vide cooker to start charging $2/month for 10-year-old companion app
“You’ve just lost a LONGTIME and very faithful customer."
I haven't used the app in a while and opened it and saw this... Well never buying Anova again
But hey at least they gave me a coupon that expired two months ago.
Imagine seeing that message and buying another product from them.
“It’s time to artificially create waste. Don’t worry, you won’t see this message again. Our new cookers are designed to not last 10 years.”
Imagine Goodyear 500 tires!...for just 30 bucks a month you too can get the most inexpensive tires of all. 500 mile tires!. After 500 miles they don't spin or hold air so we recommend setting your odometer properly.
I can't imagine why these things even need an app.
You have to set the thing up with water and all, just hit the buttons on the device.
The one and only time I used the app it lost connectivity and left my chuck roast in lukewarm water for who knows how long. Tossed it because I didn't want to kill my family with food poisoning. It's nice if you have a WIFI connected device, so you can put something on the counter in an ice water bath in the morning with the sous vide wand in there and flip it on before you leave work in the afternoon. Also seeing that the water has maintained an appropriate temp during a long cook is nice too. It's a niche case use, but that's why it's nice to have it connected.
I have a different brand, but I can see the value. The interface on the small screen on the device I have is very clumsy. Took me a while to figure it out, and I'm very tech savvy. I can see a mobile app being useful, also for notifications so I don't independently have to set timers.
Also as a former mobile dev, mobile apps take maintenance to keep up with OS changes over time. And developers are expensive.
What I imagine happened is that they probably outsourced their app development to a 3rd party, because they make hardware, not software. That contract probably expired, including their ongoing support agreement, and they've probably negotiated an hourly rate for support on-demand going forward, maybe with a different 3rd party dev.
So in all likelihood, they're just passing the cost for ongoing maintenance on an EOL model to the customer.
However, that looks absolutely insane from a consumer standpoint.
I don't know their Financials, but they may not be big enough to just swallow the cost for brand PR if they're not selling at a volume and profit margin to be able lose money on old products.
This is why, even as a dev that used to work in the mobile and IOT space, I tend to purchase dumb devices if there are good options. Smart devices get dumb as soon as the shine has dulled.
My partner has an Anovo affected by this and he knows the details better than me, but IIRC the app allows you to set times to change temps or things like that. The device still works without the app, but you lose the convenience factor of being able to monitor or make changes at a distance.
It's kinda nice to just search what you are making, click cook, and all the settings are preloaded and the device starts. The manual interface is clunky.
Size and easy to clean (and waterproof) is one, I have a ChefSteps Joule which is app control only, but it is much easier to clean, and much smaller than my old Anova (fits in a drawer with other crap)
Granted it is more annoying to use the app than the controls, but the trade off for us was worth it, if not for everyone.
I have one, and didn't know it had an app.
That’s bullshit
Actively encouraging people to toss perfectly good hardware to fuel their subscription bullshit… and these guys weren’t even recently bought by a VC firm or anything?
They were bought by Electrolux in 2017, and have been enshittifying ever since. Cheaper, lower quality parts, etc. They're just profiting from the brand as they turn it to shit. Never buy their products.
Unrelated but how would you rate sous vide cooking? I am tempted for a bunch of reasons but I'm worried it'll be just another kitchen appliance that I rarely use.
For steaks, they're excellent. About the only thing I haven't been able to do over a good steakhouse restaurant is an extremely crisply outer layer. There's some techniques there that I haven't learned yet that might fix that. Everything else about the juiciness and taste is easily the same or better.
You're basically taking all the art of out it that you would have to learn to become a top steak grill master, and replacing it with precision.
If you're not committed, you don't actually need an appliance for it, have had great results with a Dutch oven and a programmable BBQ thermometer monitoring the water temp. One of my burners goes really low so just a matter of adjusting to keep in range. You don't get forced circulation (get some natural circulation though) and it's not set and forget, but you can do with stuff you probably already have on hand. Done with heavy freezer bags before I was gifted a vacuum sealer.
I would see if there's a way to disable updates for that app.
Do you need the apk to use it at all? Or is it just a little perk to go along with it?
Hopefully, someone hacks the apk so it just keeps working.
I bought one of these years ago, and took a look at it. The app let's you remote control the stick and pick recipes that will autoset the temps. That's about it. The stick has buttons on it, and it's not like you can have it add the food to the water bath remotely. It'd pretty easy to knock in the temp at the heater while you're there
Sous vide is a "set and forget" cooking method like a crockpot. You can walk away and leave the thing running long past the minimum time and have no issues because the whole point is it takes food to an exact temp and no further. So even any alerting "temp reached" it may do now isn't really useful.
This feels like a "pick the carcass" attempt to make some money at all. I expect the company is probably in a bad state if this is the game they are playing.
"supporting them". I understand bug fixes and the inevitable support end-of-life cycle, etc; I really do. But the reasoning behind abandoning an old, yet in-use product is because you want them to buy a newer alternative.
Translation:
“Fuck you for not replacing your perfectly fine and still working 10 year old machine and making our line go up more. We’re gonna do our best to brick it because we want all of your money.”
Fuck capitalism. I will (and have been) doing my absolute to avoid buying any kind of physical device that requires an app to function
I will (and have been) doing my absolute to avoid buying any kind of physical device that requires an app to function
Same. It’s becoming more difficult every day.
if I see something requires an app, no matter how good it is otherwise. the product is dead to me. I know it is, effectively, going to break within a year or two.
Yeah, I need to start being better about this. It's a shame because I bought my joule sous vide because I like the simplicity and ability to monitor and program it remotely (helpful when cooking for 5-6h). App stopped working properly and now they've been purchased by breville and if I want to use it I need to switch and I'm guessing it won't be long before they start to drop functionallity or require some sort of subscription. There are things like this where the app is much more than a gimmick. But it sucks to have some company pulling the strings of what you can or can't do with your own hardware.
water+heat proofing is hard, or I'd suggest a DIY solution.
can't just root the sous vide?
I mean it is shitty still, but people with an old device and an account already are unaffected, plus the old devices like the one I have is completely operable offline. I've not connected it to WiFi except when I first got it to check the app out.
Wait
"Our community has literally cooked 100s of millions of times with our app. Unfortunately, each connected cook costs us money."
The cooker, It's FUCKING Bluetooth. It doesn't need to call home, it can't call home. The App, It has a list of 35 different sous vide recipes that could live on the app. The app has no business calling home, they don't need a server.
They need if they were to push firmware updates via the app that are then installed over Bluetooth, like some headphones do. But that should be a free service, and also optional. I don't really see any groundbreaking functionality added for a device that's basically a submerged motor with a temperature probe.
It's a decade old cooking appliance .
What possible firmware updates could it need at this point?
Firmware updates should not cost a subscription fee and could open them up to lawsuits.
Temperature Temperature set point Deadband Heater power Time Display temperature Display time
This can literally be handled with two non-microprocessor integrated circuits and $5 in other electronic Lego components.
It doesn't need firmware. It's a $200 oversized fish tank heater.
Even in that case the app doesn't need to phone home. It doesn't even need an internet connection on its own. You'd have to download the update yourself and then use the app to apply the patch, which is less user friendly to not-so-tech-savy users but possible. Just send an email with the necessary information to users who have subscribed to receive these kind of updates.
And if each did cost them money - they’ve been paid when the stupid thing was purchased!
Yeah, it's a $200 heater. Probably $30 in parts. You can run a small cluster for the profit in a few sales a month.
It's a cooker. Why the hell does it even need bluetooth, let alone an internet connection?
So it can notify you when the water has reached the set temperature or the time you set for cooking is up. Which can be handy. However, I found the BT very weak on my Anova and it would lose connection when I went into my home office a mere 25' away, so I stopped using it. There's actually no need for the water to be up to temperature before you put your food in, and food can sit as long as you want; half the point of sous vide is to be able to hold food at temp without overcooking. So you don't really need the timer either.
I have something similar, but wifi. Never even tried to connect to it, because you just use the buttons to set temp & time.
I can imagine, though, that an app might have buttons for 'eggs', 'yogurt', 'steak', etc. Or maybe let you program temperature-time sequences. Or let you check how much time is left from the next room. Conveniences. Definitely no need for them to phone home, though, except maybe for an ad-driven 'recipe of the week' type thing.
This is the absolute worst possible way for me to first hear about a product and company that I would have otherwise been interested in
It is utterly bullshit. But is the app required for using the device?
Also
The subscription fee will only apply to people who make an account after August 21. Those who downloaded the app and made an account before August 21 won't have to pay. But everyone will have to make an account; some people have been using the app without one until now
So it's not as bad as it seems, at least.
Except, prior to this announcement, there was apparently another statement from Anova that you can’t control the first gen ones.
the announcement follows an Anova statement saying it will no longer let users remotely control their kitchen gadgets via Bluetooth starting on September 28, 2025.
Lemmy.world needs an internet-of-shit community. This could be a solid first contribution.
It might fall into the remit of @[email protected]
That links to a user for me.
Web link is https://lemmy.world/c/enshittification
Community link: [email protected]
I passed on a lot of the fancier apartment buildings for requiring an app and a cell phone to gain access to your own home. I shouldn't have to agree to an arbitration/class action waiver to use my own front door, I don't feel comfortable with management getting a notification on their phone every time I come or go, I don't like the fact that 20+ listed partner companies have access to sensitive personal data, and I shouldn't have to wait for maintenance to show up in the middle of the night because I couldn't make it back home before my personal tracking device died on me.
The sad thing is that most of these locking units cost these apartments hundreds of dollars each on top of a monthly subscription.
What the actual fuck. In what country do you live?
U.S.. Not an actual tracking device, just a cell phone. I usually leave it at home, which would have been impossible to do at many of those buildings.
management getting a notification
Isn't that a giant privacy violation? Why does anyone need to know when you come or go?
"...to maintain the safety and security of the building and everyone in it." - An actual FAQ
Way to make home feel like a prison.
Sounds like it's time for an open sauce alternative.
They're just going to push people to the cheaper units at this point.
I was looking at sous vide cookers a few months back and was considering ANOVA but they were too expensive. Opted for a generic one instead.
The fact that they're more expensive and require a subscription for what's essentially a set of presets that my cheap unit has for free is just ridiculous.
Interesting, because when they were relatively new, they were also the cheap option. Sous vide used to be a $1000+ thing. I did a DIY version for around $200, but later Anova came out and it was less sketchy than my box of wires running mains voltage.
Instant Pot seems to make a pretty good one that fits around the sides of their pressure cookers.
Anova's app is basically useless. Could be nice for looking up temperatures and times for specific things, but I usually google it, anyway. Steaks are by far the most common thing I do sous vide, so it's usually preset for that. Never used the app outside of playing with it when I first got it.
One thing is for sure: I won't be recommending Anova to friends anymore.
Could be nice for looking up temperatures and times for specific things, but I usually google it
Well... who knows how long until we start getting billed for that, too.
I refuse to use one that requires bluetooth or an account. I want to turn the bitch on and go do shit for 4+hr. There's nothing fancy about the process. Some real Ron Popeil shit and they try to force apps on us.
Does it require?
This summer I spent way too much money on a grill with an app. The thing is it’s a smoker so i might run it all day and the app lets me check on it while still doing other stuff all that time.
However the app is an extra, and I would still have all functionality besides removing if the app went away. I’d be pissed losing remote functionality after spending so much money, but I’d still be able to use the grill normally
Were gonna need to pirate sous vides now
Other than my computer, phone and xbox, I own nothing at all that can connect to the Internet. It's incredibly stupid.
I have a smart TV and a Bluray player as well, but other than that, only phones, computers, and my Switch connect to the internet. My next TV will likely not be smart, because screw ads, and I've ripped all of my Blurays.
I own some things that can, but that doesn't mean they do.
My bloody dishwasher asked for my wifi password when I first connected it.
Oh ffs.. This is the one I have..
And, you know what? The firmware sucks.
You can't even connect to wifi if you have two AP's with the same name (which is literally everyone).
I haven't even installed the app in ages because it's a PITA and has never worked 100%.
But, they can guarantee my next one won't be an anova again. There are much cheaper alternatives now
I'd recommend anova brand
Oi bruv, it's anova kitchin appluiance asking for moy woyfoy passwood.
Damn autocorrect was fighting me on every word lol
yeah...ummm...no
The subscription fee will only apply to people who make an account after August 21. Those who downloaded the app and made an account before August 21 won't have to pay. But everyone will have to make an account; some people have been using the app without one until now.
"You helped us build Anova, and our intent is that you will be grandfathered in forever," Svajian wrote
Fuck everything about this, but at least they have the decency not to pull the rug on people who bought it without this stupidity.
The only real benefit of the app to me is the push notifications, but losing those would be douchey. It would be far better to allow that basic functionality and put all the recipe shit behind the wall.
I have one of their's that can connect to your phone. It's not needed, it just adds extra cook book functions. It even hosts it so you can control the sous vide when you're not at home, almost like a reverse proxy.
But yea the physical buttons work fine without the app.
My car works fine without a seat warmer, but if you sold it to me as part of the car then later it started charging me a subscription I'd be pretty pissed.
Yeah, I barely use the app, but this is a bullshit anti-consumer move that leaves me with zero reason to trust the company going forward.
What I like about having the Bluetooth connection to the app, is mostly just to see when the water has come up to temperature.
But that was apparently too much to ask, since it says that they are also removing the Bluetooth functionality from the app...
You wouldn't download a sous vide
The wifi ones work with Home Assistant so you won't lose remote features. The bad news is you have to run home assistant and set it up.
As for the BT only version you need more work and a BT proxy. https://community.home-assistant.io/t/anova-ble-control-via-ble-proxy/550295
The original models will. While Home assistant has an Anova integration, it is cloud dependent and it's the cloud that will discontinue support. As I understand it.
Local control uses a Bluetooth bridge which I guess is my next project.
I have never bought an appliance or physical product that requires an app to use, and I never will until our society has deteriorated to the the point where there is no alternative to that in order to get by in it. It's almost at that point already with smartphones but for now it's still possible to get by without one.
2$/month for a fucking thermostat....
I personally think it's perfectly reasonable for a company to eventually start charging for a service they provide that costs them money to provide. They might bakenin some number of years into the product price, but they can't keep providing the service for free forever.
It seems like something that should be expected if we do want certain services to be provided and maintained. Heck, I also think that offering a subscription is better than the usual alternative, which is that the company just shuts the service down.
However, the way this is done is almost always slimy and shitty and likely is only going to get solved by regulation.
- It's incredibly rare that IOT devices NEED cloud integration. Most of the time it really SHOULD just be local-only, or have a local option.
- If they are going to start charging for something to continue to work, unless there was already an explicit agreement that - and when - this would happen, they need to provide an alternative.
- Either documentation or open software for how an alternate cloud - including local - could be used instead.
- That info really should be mandatory to be made available beforehand in case the company shuts down.
- The subscription fee needs to be reasonable.
- Personally, I think $24/year is still far too much, but it's still WAY more reasonable than some I've seen.
Should be a no-brainer.
People who made accounts before they start charging will be grandfathered in for free.
OK, cool, that's also better than normal.
Until that changes, or they shut it down.
Edit: ah, I missed that in the article and everything.
Part of the problem comes when companies go out of their way to provide a service on their end that could be covered reasonably easily on the consumer's side of things. Why put a few cents worth of storage in a device and make it locally accessible when you can make it cloud-connected and hosted to turn it into a revenue stream?
Another example, GM has had OnStar for ages. It does the same things your cell phone does, so it's hard to justify the subscription. Plus Android Auto/Car Play works really well and relies on something you update more often. So naturally, GM revamped their infotainment to do the things you'd have your phone do and got rid of Android Auto/Car Play.
It's all pure CEO bullshit though, and none of it is real.
It doesn't cost money to send a Bluetooth signal from your phone to a sous vide. Maybe the WiFi server costs money but it's their own fault for adding stupid functionality that phones home.
I've got one of these and I'm prepared to bet money that almost all of their server costs come down to every recipe in the app just being a link to a web page with lots of photos. https://recipes.anovaculinary.com/
Thing is they needed to factor this j to the cost of selling the device.
It basically costs them nothing to ru the service for this device. If they failed to calculate that as part of the sale price, that’s not the consumers fault.
I wish people would stop threatening companies switching to subscription that they'll lose business. The c-suite know they'll lose much of the current customer base. They're banking on the data telling them that the market acceptance of their product is gaining traction with new customers.
That will float them until they tell grandfathered users to go screw themselves and will face all sorts of new charges to use their app as previously established.
This is what happens when you have companies run by MBAs and lawyers. They respond to the data, and as long as the data says any negative responses can be overcome in some other way, they'll do it. They don't care about their clientele (or their employees for that matter). They care about the extra millions of dollars they were promised for the degrees they paid for.
Start finding alternate solutions to any product that connects to the internet. Then they can't spy on you or handcuff a sub fee to their product.
Enshittification strikes again. 🤬
someone can just make a cracked version people can sideload
I bet the app requires cloud hosting for it to run, and its starting to eat away at the profits they made.
If it needs nothing but bluetooth, then this a pure money grab.
It use to operate only off of Bluetooth, & then they added single band WiFi. They just added dual band WiFi as a new feature & are now removing Bluetooth functionality completely.
Absolutely a cash grab.
Usually, if it needs cloud hosting, it's because they're collecting your data. That presumably is a revenue stream for them.
I have one of these, and I haven't touched the app. Works perfectly fine without it.
I will never throw a brick through the headquarters of Anova, nor would I advocate for others doing it.
I have two Anova cookers and have never needed the app fwiw
I honestly didn't know there was an app and use mine a few times a month.
Guess inkbird are going to get recommended a lot more...
Are they good?
I have an Inkbird & really like it. Significantly less expensive than Annova, offers all of the same features from what I can tell, & it’s never given me any issues.
The app is of course a bit clunky & ultimately unnecessary, but it does actually function as advertised.
I don't actually own any of their products but the bbq community generally speaks very highly of it. I figure whenever my current SV stick dies (not an ANOVA, it's a knockoff from Aldi lol), I need a backup so I've kept an eye on the market...
For those of us on Android, can't we download the old APK which still talks Bluetooth and just never interact with the web/wifi for these?
The app phones home to access recipes.
Maybe it works without access to the server, but maybe it just refuses to do anything.
I have one of these. The sous vide cooker itself is very nice and easy to use, I’d highly recommend it. The app is a bit clunky and not necessary to use the device. I certainly wouldn’t pay $2 a month for it.
The app lets you set a temperature and cook time, but you can also do this using the buttons on the cooker. Sometimes the WiFi pairing is finicky, so honestly I skip the app half the time. The app also lets you view and write recipes. I guess the big advantage is you can click “start cooking” and it automatically sets the device temp and time, but doing it manually isn’t much harder. I’m also not wowed by the in-app recipe selection, and generally just get recipes from the internet.
They do this, because plebs pay...
There is a lesson in there
Lol. Hell no.
Y'all should read Unauthorized Bread from Cory Doctorow. This hits so close to home.
Cost or no cost, IoT should not be able to brick devices on the whim - or unexpected dissolution - of a faceless corporation.
Unfortunately too many people are trusting of monolithic entities which promise the moon and then decide what they really meant was "bend over".
I may be channelling a bit of Louis Rossman here.
That said, the other comments here suggest that the device in question still has all features when accessed from the front panel, which is a step up from a lot of other IoT behaviour. Owners who don't want to pay for the app should still disconnect it from any connectivity and keep it that way just in case the manufacturer decides to remove that functionality as well.
And if it stops working altogether without network connectivity, take the L and maybe mail it back to the company's head office with no return address. Let them deal with the e-waste.
entities which promise the moon and then decide what they really meant was “bend over”.
LOL, nice one.
I was given one of those. I tried the app once and immediately uninstalled it. It's worthless. The "let's put AI in your computer mouse, toothbrush, and toilet scrubber!" of ten years ago.
Oh good, it's not the joule. That would suck big time. You can only use it via the app.
It's not the Joule.... Yet
Good thing there are other good options out there by now. That would be a deal breaker for sure.
That was my first thought as well. I love that thing but I hate that it requires the app to run
Yeah. I have two different sticks. A cheap one because "no way is the joule that good" and the joule because "shit, maybe it is".
And it is. But an interface on the stick would make it perfect.
Lame move. That being said, I never use the app. It's very easy to set the temperature without it.
Oof, you too with the enshittificafion and planned obsolescence, Anova?
My new microwave rotates for free!!. The 9 dollar MW subscription gets me 500W, the 15 dollar gets me 1500W and with the $30 monthly subscription I can get 3000W! It's wonderful!
I forgot my ANOVA when I moved this summer. Now, I'm not that sorry I did.
I mean they can ask, lol
I used the app once when I first got mine and never needed it again. I haven’t had a need for it as I start it, and then come back later. If I need a timer I can set one on my phone.
First Inwas like Yeeeah to all the "smart stuff". But more and more I'm thinking - what happens to current cars after some time? When all the connected crap gets disconnected? Currently you can fix and drive any old piece of junk and drive it in theory forever. What happens when the smart cars lose connection to mothership? What happens when all the electronics go bad and there is no way to fix it? Same goes for your fridge, coffee maker, etc.
In the long run, having it all running Free Software is the only way to ensure it can be supported indefinitely. I have a zero-tolerance policy against proprietary software in my devices, and you should too.
Honestly the Bluetooth app is dog shit. Haven't used it in years because it's far easier to just roll the dial. ANOVA should be paying me for distress.
You know, This kind of shit happens so frequently anymore that if you're dumb enough to buy things that, for absolutely no reason, requires an internet connection and/or an app.. Then you deserve what you get.
It's sometimes hard to find, I needed a new stove, all the ones I could afford and that had what we needed had a fucking internet connection. I fucking hate it.
I'm not being sarcastic or attacking or anything, but I find that hard to believe. I spent 2 minutes before posting this looking at ranges and ovens (I dont know if you're talking about a complete stove unit (burners on top of an oven in a self contained stand alone package) or the oven unit that mounts into a wall, so I looked at both in that time) and I found tons that were cheap (well, cheap as far as these devices ago at least) and none of them had smart connectivity.
It wasnt until I was getting into the high cost items that were $5000+ that smart stuff started appearing.
Username checks out
Hey, I may be a random idiot, but I've never fuckin paid a 300%+ premium for a smart device, nor cried when it predictably either died early or started charging for use because corporate fuckery.
You had the choice to not buy it, You can not in the year 2024, not be aware of how this shit always, inevitably goes down.
It's not unreasonable to start charging for an app like that if it is under active maintenance, that costs money for the company after all.
But the lesson for the consumer is: Don't buy tools that rely on apps or servers ran by someone else unless you want to eventually start paying rent..
Imagine buying a devices that makes you install a program on a device you have to keep on you at all times and which probably contains all of your personal and financial information.
Like 98% of the human race are absolute fucking morons.
Think about it after 10 years either the app is not supported by your operating system or their server is offline.
I need to gadget that's works with flip of switch and has all the functions offline even after 10 years.
If people don't understand this facts they are morons.