# Hue Scintillator — Animated home lighting effects

> Design animated lighting effects for smart bulbs with full control. (iPhone/iPad app by Flaming Pear Software.)

- Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/hue-scintillator/id668223674 (this page in markdown: same URL + `.md`)
- Developer: [Flaming Pear Software](https://appshunter.io/developer/483693998)
- Category: Lifestyle, Entertainment
- Price: $2.99
- Rating: 3.00/5 from 19 App Store ratings · 110 written reviews indexed
- Age rating: 4+
- Requires: iOS 12.0 · 12 MB
- Languages: American English
- Released: 2013-07-08
- Data updated: 2026-06-10
- Monetization: paid
- User reviews in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/hue-scintillator/id668223674/reviews.md

## What is Hue Scintillator?

Design animated lighting effects for Philips Hue, LIFX, Nanoleaf, and Avea with full control over color, speed, style, and more.

Just choose a mode, a palette, and up to 50 bulbs — right away the room comes to life with changing color. 

Scintillator includes lots of pre-built effects and color palettes to get you started. Change them or make your own with the couldn’t-be-simpler editors. 

For setting a mood, throwing a party, or just watching a movie, Scintillator creates a living colorscape to suit the occasion. 

 
“Great for showing off what the bulbs can do.” — Digital Trends

“Best app for making light animations” — KuipoqiuK

"Simple, elegant. Gorgeous." – HotelGulf718

“Just mesmerizing.” — Dhrubin


Features:

◆ Gorgeous pre-built effects by the dozen

◆ Music visualizer with custom colors

◆ Scintillator understands traditional artists’ color harmony! Automatically create colors that look good together 

◆ Lots of bulbs? Run multiple effects at the same time

◆ Full color palette editor with nearly unlimited swatches

◆ Sleep timers for automatic fade-and-stop

◆ Bulb set editor organizes all your bulbs

◆ Pull colors from photos

◆ Master brightness control per effect 

◆ Fast or ultra-gradual effects up to 1200 seconds per step 

◆ Listening sensitivity makes effects reacts to sound 

◆ Share lighting designs with friends

◆ Import color palettes from COLOURlovers and Dribbble


To use Scintillator you need at least one of...
- a Philips Hue bridge with at least one controlled bulb
- LIFX bulbs
- Nanoleaf panels and controller
- an Elgato Avea bulb and an iOS device with Bluetooth 4.0

LIFX bulbs should have the latest firmware update from http://www.lifx.com/pages/updates .

See meethue.com, lifx.co, nanoleaf.me, or elgato.com for more information.

## Key features

- Animated lighting effects
- Music visualizer
- Color harmony
- Multiple effects simultaneously
- Color palette editor
- Sleep timers
- Pull colors from photos

## What do users think of Hue Scintillator?

Overall sentiment: mixed

**Pros**

- 🎨 Highly customizable animations and color effects
- 👍 Intuitive and elegant user interface
- 🎵 Music visualization and synchronization features
- 🔄 Runs in background after phone locks
- 💰 One-time purchase with no in-app purchases
- 🎭 Extensive preset library for quick setup
- ⚡ Responsive and seamless performance
- 🎯 Granular control over bulb groups and sets
- 🎪 Excellent for parties and ambient lighting

**Cons**

- 🐛 Frequent connectivity issues with smart bulbs
- 📱 App stops working when phone is locked (older versions)
- 🔴 Microphone always-on indicator causes privacy concerns
- 🎵 Music visualization doesn't work reliably
- 📉 Inconsistent support for different light brands
- 🔌 High battery consumption
- 🚫 Limited bulb selection/configuration options
- ⚠️ Poor customer support and unresponsive developers
- 🔋 Interferes with Bluetooth audio playback
- ❌ Removed support for multiple light platforms over time

**Commonly reported bugs**

- Cannot connect to Hue Bridge despite finding it
- Only controls subset of detected lights
- Nanoleaf animations not functioning
- LIFX bulb connectivity broken
- SYLVANIA/Osram Lightify support removed without notice
- Avea Bluetooth bulb support unreliable
- Apple Music library greyed out and non-functional
- Music visualizer doesn't change light colors
- App crashes when editing bulb sets
- Animations stop when app closes
- Lights lose connection after being turned off
- Manual bridge IP entry required instead of auto-discovery
- Color palette selection produces unintended colors

**Most requested features**

- Spotify and Pandora music integration instead of Apple Music only
- Siri Shortcuts support
- Timer and alarm functionality
- Ability to lock bulbs to same color with synchronized animations
- Notification widget and quick toggle
- Better documentation and in-app instructions
- Ability to sequence multiple animations
- User-created scene sharing database
- Faster animation speeds
- Precise CIE color specification controls
- Microphone input option for music visualization
- iPad-specific version
- Background operation without microphone requirement

## Recent user reviews (10 of 110)

All indexed reviews: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/hue-scintillator/id668223674/reviews.md

### 2/5 — Animations don’t work in Nanoleaf

*2024-03-06, version 1.83*

Wish I hadn’t paid for this.  The animations don’t work which is what this app is for. Super disappointed.

### 1/5 — Revised review

*2023-10-04*

This was a 5 star app at one point. I got it because it worked with Hue and Lightify flawlessly. I continued to expanded my setup extensively using hue and Lightify, then one day Lightify would not work with it at all. No response from developer and then all of a sudden they completely removed Lightify support. It does however control my Avea Bluetooth bulb, I wonder how long it will be before they remove the support for that. Update: now it will no longer control the lifx bulbs, no way to add them either.

### 1/5 — Worthless

*2023-08-21*

This used to be an amazing app but no longer will it connect to the Hue Bridge.

### 5/5 — Pure garbage.

*2023-04-27*

If you want seamless animations using a large selection of presets or create one of your own, this is your app. Simple,elegant. Gorgeous color variations to just zone out or set to your favorite party mix. Animations run after your phone has gone to sleep.

### 1/5 — Doesn’t work with LIFX

*2022-11-29*

No way to add LIFX bulbs. Waste of money :(

### 1/5 — Piss poor support , will not work with SYLVANIA  Smart Bulbs

*2021-08-21, version 1.82*

For some reason, I found this out by checking the revision history, they have dropped the ability to use the app with SYLVANIA smart bulbs. As I have all SYLVANIA bulbs the app is now useless for me and I had to pay to get it!!!

### 5/5 — Best Hue App

*2021-06-21*

I’ve been using this app for years, and still no other app has come close to the functionality this one provides. It’s by far the most featured app for having lights display multiple colors in varying methods.  It’s a must for party background lighting

### 5/5 — The only hue app u need

*2021-06-01, version 1.82*

It’s absolutely awesome this app. You can create limitless combinations of light. All the other apps I tested asked for ongoing subscription and were quite limited. This app is a thousand times better than anything else I tried.

### 4/5 — Music library shows songs but won’t play any

*2020-09-04*

I just purchased the app and I’m trying to use the visualizer and I can see my music library but I’m unable to play any of the songs.  The apps ui is clean and straight forward and very easy to use and setup.  Except being unable to get my music library to work pretty great first impression.

### 1/5 — Apple Music doesn’t work, finds 9 lights but only controls 3

*2020-08-02*

I’m pretty sure the two reviews here are fake, first off it says it found nine hue lights however there’s absolutely no way to configure any of these lights and for whatever reason it only controls two of the lights and my light strips, the rest don’t seem to do anything through this app. Secondly it didn’t automatically find my bridge or a friend of mine’s bridge; I figured my Internet connection might be a little weird due to our network set up so I tried his which has his hub plugged directly into the router. Unfortunately the only way to set it up was to manually enter my bridge IP address. Apple Music integration finds all of my music but it’s all grey’ed out, doesn’t work. Unfortunately because they didn’t add a microphone option you can’t even use the music visualization feature. How terrible can you be where you force people to use one music option (Apple Music) which is integrated directly into your app (and broken) instead of having something like a mic option to listen to music in the room instead.  There’s absolutely no way to configure which lights that this app uses that I found, the interface is terribly stupid and simple, all together it seems like a half-baked app that still in beta testing and never gets updated.

**Developer response:** To use more lights, try this:
- Double-tap an effect to get the effect editor.
- Next, tap the yellow circles to get the bulb editor.
- Then choose the bulbs you want from the list.
Once you make a bulb set, you can use it with multiple effects.

## Frequently asked questions about Hue Scintillator

### What does Hue Scintillator do?

Hue Scintillator allows you to design and control animated lighting effects for compatible smart bulbs like Philips Hue, LIFX, Nanoleaf, and Avea. You can customize colors, speed, and styles to create dynamic lightscapes for various moods and occasions.

### What are the key features of Hue Scintillator?

Key features include a music visualizer, automatic color harmony suggestions, the ability to run multiple effects at once, a comprehensive color palette editor, sleep timers, and the option to pull colors from photos. It also offers pre-built effects and sharing capabilities.

### How much does Hue Scintillator cost?

Based on the provided information, Hue Scintillator is a paid application. There are no mentions of in-app purchases or advertisements, indicating a one-time purchase model.

### What smart lighting systems are compatible with Hue Scintillator?

The app is compatible with Philips Hue bridge and bulbs, LIFX bulbs, Nanoleaf panels and controllers, and Elgato Avea bulbs. Ensure your devices have the latest firmware and your iOS device has Bluetooth 4.0 for Avea.

### What are common use cases for Hue Scintillator?

Common use cases include setting a mood for relaxation or movie nights, creating vibrant atmospheres for parties, or simply showcasing the full capabilities of your smart bulbs with mesmerizing animations. It can also be used to automatically fade lights off with sleep timers.

## Version history (last 5 releases)

### 1.83 — 2022-02-15

- Fixed an issue with connecting to Nanoleaf.
- Cosmetic fixes.

### 1.82 — 2021-01-02

- Improves communication with Nanoleaf

### 1.81 — 2020-01-15

- Fixes discovery problem with the Gen 2 Hue bridge.

### 1.80 — 2019-05-25

Fixes a visual defect in the bulb set editor where bulb names would appear improperly highlighted.

### 1.79 — 2019-04-09

- Control Nanoleaf panels.

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## More apps by Flaming Pear Software

- [Short Words](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/short-words/id483693995)
- [Flood Filter for Water Reflections](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/flood-filter-for-water-reflections/id732242047)
- [Hue TV](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/hue-tv/id1006388597)
- [Global Sunrise](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/global-sunrise/id1514970668)

All apps by Flaming Pear Software: https://appshunter.io/developer/483693998

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*Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-06-10.*