The Complete Guide to PowerView Smart Home Integration with Hunter Douglas Applause

Your home's window treatments shouldn't require you to walk room to room, pulling cords and adjusting slats. With Hunter Douglas PowerView Gen 3 automation paired with Applause honeycomb shades, your windows respond to your voice, your schedule, and even the position of the sun — all without you lifting a finger. For Treasure Valley homeowners who want both the energy efficiency of honeycomb construction and the convenience of true smart home automation, this combination represents the gold standard in modern window treatments.

What Is PowerView Gen 3?

PowerView Gen 3 is Hunter Douglas's latest automation platform, representing a significant leap forward from previous generations. Built on Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) technology, Gen 3 eliminates the need for a dedicated WiFi bridge that earlier systems required. The result is faster response times, more reliable connections, and a simpler setup process. Gen 3 shades also report their position back to the hub automatically, so your app always shows exactly where each shade is positioned — even if someone adjusted it manually with the Pebble Remote.

The system is controlled through the PowerView App, available for both iOS and Android, which serves as your command center for creating scenes, setting schedules, and managing every shade in your home. But the app is just the beginning. PowerView Gen 3 connects to virtually every major smart home ecosystem on the market, making your Applause shades part of a truly unified home.

Voice Control: Your Shades Listen

One of the most immediately satisfying features of PowerView is voice control. Whether you're an Alexa household, a Google Home family, or an Apple ecosystem devotee, PowerView Gen 3 speaks your language.

Amazon Alexa

The native Alexa integration is Hunter Douglas's most feature-rich voice platform. Simply say "Alexa, open the living room shades" or "Alexa, set the bedroom shades to 50 percent." You can also activate entire PowerView Scenes — coordinated shade positions across multiple rooms — with a single voice command. The integration supports individual shade control, room-level control, and scene activation, giving you granular flexibility or whole-home convenience.

Google Home

PowerView offers both a native Google Home integration and a Matter-based integration, each with different feature sets. The native integration provides direct, well-tested control, while the Matter integration opens up additional automation possibilities through Google's evolving smart home platform. Either way, "Hey Google, close the kitchen shades" works exactly as you'd expect.

Apple HomeKit & Siri

Through Matter integration, PowerView Gen 3 connects seamlessly with Apple Home and Siri. A PowerView Gateway or Gateway Pro is required for this integration, but once set up, you can control your shades from the Apple Home app on any Apple device — iPhone, iPad, Mac, or Apple Watch. Try saying "Hey Siri, open the living room shades" or "Hey Siri, set the left shade to 50 percent." Your shades also appear in Apple Home's automation engine, so you can tie them into broader HomeKit scenes and automations.

Matter: The Future-Proof Standard

One of the most significant additions to PowerView Gen 3 is Matter support. Matter is the new universal smart home standard developed by the Connectivity Standards Alliance (CSA) — the same organization behind Zigbee. It's an open protocol designed to connect devices across different brands and platforms, ensuring that your smart home investments work together today and well into the future.

What does this mean for you? It means your PowerView shades won't become obsolete as the smart home landscape evolves. Matter is backed by Apple, Google, Amazon, and Samsung, among others. As new platforms and devices adopt Matter, your PowerView shades will be compatible with them automatically. It's the closest thing to a guarantee of future compatibility that exists in the smart home world.

Automated Scheduling: Your Home Runs Itself

Voice control is convenient, but the real power of PowerView lies in automation. Through the PowerView App, you can create detailed schedules that move your shades throughout the day without any input from you at all.

• •Morning wake-up: Shades gradually open with the sunrise, letting natural light ease you awake instead of an alarm.
• •Midday energy management: South-facing shades lower during peak sun hours to reduce cooling costs, then reopen as the sun moves.
• •Evening privacy: All shades close at sunset, giving you whole-home privacy without remembering to close each one.
• •Away mode: Shades raise and lower at varied times throughout the day, giving your home a lived-in appearance while you're on vacation.
• •Scene activation: Create custom scenes like 'Movie Night' (all shades fully closed) or 'Morning Coffee' (kitchen shades open, bedroom shades at 50%) and activate them with one tap or voice command.

For Idaho homeowners, the scheduling capability is particularly valuable. During our intense summers, you can program south- and west-facing Applause shades to lower during the hottest hours, leveraging their double-cell honeycomb insulation to block solar heat gain. In winter, the same shades can be scheduled to open during sunny hours to capture free solar warmth, then close at dusk to trap that heat inside. This kind of intelligent automation doesn't just add convenience — it directly reduces your energy bills.

Control Options Beyond the App

While the app and voice control handle most situations, PowerView Gen 3 also includes physical control options for those moments when you want a tactile button press. The Pebble Remote — available in a range of colors to match your decor — uses RF radio technology for reliable, line-of-sight-free control. Mount it on the wall next to a light switch, keep it on a nightstand, or carry it room to room. Each Pebble can control individual shades, rooms, or scenes.

For whole-home installations, the PowerView Gateway or Gateway Pro serves as the central hub, connecting all your shades and enabling the smart home integrations described above. The Gateway Pro adds support for larger installations and additional integration options, making it ideal for homes with 20 or more motorized shades.

Why Applause + PowerView Is the Ideal Combination

Hunter Douglas offers PowerView motorization across many of their product lines, but the pairing with Applause honeycomb shades is particularly compelling for Idaho homeowners. Applause shades feature a double-cell honeycomb construction that creates insulating air pockets, delivering measurable energy efficiency improvements. When you add PowerView automation, you're not just getting motorized convenience — you're getting an intelligent energy management system.

• •Double-cell honeycomb construction provides superior insulation with an R-value that outperforms single-cell designs.
• •American-made quality with Hunter Douglas's industry-leading warranty and craftsmanship.
• •Available in light filtering and blackout opacities to suit every room's needs.
• •Top-down/bottom-up option lets you lower from the top for privacy while keeping the upper portion open for natural light.
• •Motorized arch and angled shade options for specialty windows — all controlled through PowerView.
• •Cordless design eliminates dangling cords, making them the safest option for homes with children and pets.

Power Options That Fit Your Home

One common concern with motorized shades is power. PowerView Gen 3 offers flexible options to suit every installation. The rechargeable battery wand is the most popular choice — it slides discreetly into the headrail and provides months of operation on a single charge. When the battery runs low, simply remove the wand, charge it via USB, and slide it back in. No electrician required.

For homeowners who prefer a set-it-and-forget-it approach, hardwired power eliminates batteries entirely. This is ideal for new construction or major renovations where wiring can be run during the build. There's also a solar panel option for shades near windows that receive consistent sunlight — the panel charges the battery continuously, so you may never need to remove it for charging.

What a Smart Shade Installation Looks Like

When you work with Boise Blinds for a PowerView Applause installation, the process is straightforward. During your free in-home consultation, we measure every window and discuss your automation goals — which rooms you want to control together, what schedules make sense for your lifestyle, and which smart home platform you use. We handle the complete installation, including shade mounting, PowerView programming, app setup, and smart home integration. By the time we leave, your shades respond to your voice, your app, and your schedule.

Frequently Asked Questions