Illumination for the holiday season, the Philips Hue Festavia adds a dash of extra spirit to Christmas trees, Festivus poles, and anywhere else you want to use string lights, given its cost of $159 for a 65-foot strand, you'll probably want to use them all year round.

Philips Hue has been on many lists of best smart lights. Despite its high price tag, the company has put forth some creative ideas over the years. In this review of the Philips Hue Festavia, we hung it on our Christmas tree and tried out what the light can do, including syncing with our Spotify account.

The Philips Hue Festavia light was released on philips-hue.com in November 2022 for $159 (opens in new tab). As of this writing, it is sold out.

If you want to use the lights, you also need the Philips Hue Bridge ($59, sold separately (opens in new tab)) so you can control them with the Hue app.

The Festavia lights are approximately 65 feet long and have 250 lights. These are connected to a small box, which in turn is connected to a larger power source. The only way to turn off the lights is to unplug the cord or use the Hue app.

I found that one strand of Festavia lights is just enough for an 8-foot Fraser fir that is about 4 feet wide at the base. Unfortunately, it is not possible to add lights to the ends of the Festavia, as is done with traditional Christmas lights. So, if you decorate half of the tree and then realize you need more lights, you're in a bit of a bind. Also, while LEDs are more durable than traditional incandescent bulbs, the individual bulbs in Festavia's lights are not replaceable.

The lights come in a box on a cardboard spool.

What sets Festavia's lights apart from other Christmas lights is that they can be controlled via the Hue app. Changing the color of the lights is just the beginning. [For starters, you can select three colors as a starting point, midpoint, and end point to create a gradient along the entire strand. You can also change the starting position of the midpoint. If you want a more scattered look, you can choose up to five different colors and have them appear randomly along the strand.

Here you can also choose whether to use the full color spectrum or only different white temperatures, as well as the overall brightness of the strands.

The Hue app also has a wide variety of "scenes," which are predefined color palettes that can be applied to the lights. Custom scenes can also be created based on photos.

There are only three effects to choose from: Candle, Fireplace, and Sparkle, which I liked the most. The Sparkle effect has a subtle shimmer to each light. It is the setting I liked best and continued to use the most.

One of the most clever tricks is to sync the lights to the music playing on Spotify. This requires a Spotify account (of course) and connecting within the Hue app. Once that is done, you can choose how the lights respond to the music, the colors to use, the intensity of the effect, and the brightness.

Apart from the Hue app, the Festavia lights can also be connected to Alexa or Google Assistant for voice control, or added to an Alexa routine to turn all lights on and off simultaneously.

Search Amazon for Christmas lights and you will find any number of string lights. Many of them come with remote controls and can change colors and flash on and off in patterns.

However, as this Philips Hue Festavia review shows, the Festavia lights have some additional features that give you more control over the lights. So if you want the most high-tech holiday lights, the Philips Hue Festavia is worth getting excited about.