Ground-Fault Circuit Interrupters, aka GFCIs, are usually found in outlets in our homes.  In fact, the National Electrical Code which, in one form or another, has been adopted in all 50 states, requires GFCI outlets.  They provide a measure of safety against electrocution by examining the flow of electricity through the outlet and, when an unexpected “imbalance” occurs, such as when electricity is flowing through a person, it trips and shuts off the flow of electricity.  This is particularly important in areas where people, water, and electricity may come into contact, such as in bathrooms, the kitchen, or outside of the home.  In the home, it is common for outlets to be wired in series—for one outlet to be wired to another and another and so on.  A GFCI outlet will provide GFCI protection for any other outlet wired through that outlet.  This is great because it means you don’t need a GFCI outlet for every outlet in your home and GFCI outlets because of the added circuitry needed, are much more expensive than regular outlets.  The flip side of this is that when it trips, all outlets wired through the GFCI outlet will lose power and if you are using a device through one of the downstream outlets it can be a challenge to determine which GFCI outlet tripped causing your power problem.  Until now.

Enter the Leviton Smart GFCI.  It is a GFCI outlet that includes WiFi, allowing it to communicate with the My Leviton app when the GFCI is triggered.  This way, if a GFCI tripped, you can get a notification on your phone that it tripped, and exactly which outlet tripped and, in addition, the outlet itself will beep.  For me this has been a food-saving lifesaver as I have it in my garage and when, for whatever unexpected reason it trips, I get message on my phone and hear a beeping when I walk in the garage.  Before we had this, we had lost food because our garage GFCI had tripped a couple of days prior to our finding out and our food had gone bad.

There is another solution to this problem and that is to use a GFCI circuit breaker.  This is a much more expensive to purchase and expensive to install option.

I highly recommend this outlet when upgrading/installing new, not just for the peace of mind of knowing when your GFCIs have tripped but also for the time- and frustration-saving convenience of knowing exactly which GFCI has tripped.  It costs only around $20 more than a “dumb” GFCI (https://a.co/d/6Ba2Gj8) and when you replace your GFCI and, since GFCIs often need replacing every 10 to 20 years, unless your home is new, you may be replacing your GFCIs in the next few years.  Save yourself future headaches and use Leviton’s Smart GFCI outlet.

I did not discuss Arc-Fault Circuit Interrupters, AFCIs, which are used to help prevent electrical fires caused by electrical arcing. Nor did I mention combination GFCI/AFCI outlets which perform the functions of both because this is a topic for another day, and, in part, because neither Leviton, nor any other manufacturer presently makes a smart GFCI/AFCI combination outlet.  (Leviton, this is a hint that there is an enormous market that is yours for the taking.)