A tenant bought a smart plug for their lamp expecting it to also control the socket their fridge was plugged into across the room. It doesn't work that way: a smart plug only controls whatever's plugged directly into it, not the wall socket underneath it.

What Each One Actually Is

A smart plug is a compact adaptor: it plugs into an existing 13A socket, and whatever appliance you want to control plugs into the smart plug in turn. No electrician needed, no wiring changed. It connects to your home Wi-Fi and can be switched on and off from a phone app or voice assistant, and some models report energy usage.

A smart socket, by contrast, replaces the wall socket itself. The unit is hardwired into the fixed installation by a qualified electrician, exactly as any other socket replacement would be, and the smart control (app, voice, scheduling) is built into the socket permanently rather than living in a separate adaptor plugged into it.

Which One Actually Suits Your Job

If the job is a rewire, a new-build fit-out, or a client who wants a genuinely integrated smart home from the first fix, wiring in dedicated smart sockets at the right points gives a cleaner result with no adaptors to lose, forget to reset after a power cut, or outgrow as the household's device count grows.

If the job is a retrofit into an existing let, a rental property, or simply adding smart control to one or two specific appliances without touching the fixed wiring, a plug-in smart adaptor does the job at a fraction of the cost and effort, and can move with the tenant or the appliance if either one changes.

Neither is more "correct" than the other. The right choice depends on whether the job already involves opening up the wiring, and how permanent the smart control needs to be.