How to Fix Your Nest Thermostat When it Won’t Respond

If you purchased the Nest Thermostat you have probably heard about the recent issues and may be living in fear of being left without heat in the dead of winter. 

But fear not! 

Nest Support has published an informative page with the very convenient title “What to do if your Nest Thermostat has become slow, unresponsive, or won’t turn on.” Obvious, much? 

For complete instructions, see Nest Support page. For a quick overview, keep on reading: 

Nest Thermostats that were updated recently to software version 5.1.3 or later may have some issues, including becoming unresponsive, not correctly charging the battery, or turning off completely. Nest recommends recharging and restarting your thermostat to rectify the issue and get it up and running again. 

Signs of this issue include the following: 

  • The thermostat being down on the Nest’s mobile app and disconnected from the Wi-Fi 
  • The thermostat notifies you that the battery is low and it needs to turn off 
  • The thermostat’s animated properties are slower than usual 
  • The thermostat shows a notification that says, “Please remove the thermostat from its base, then reattach it;” 
  • The thermostat’s display is black and unresponsive (you may also see a blinking red or green light above the display) 
  • The thermostat can’t control the corresponding HVAC unit(s) 

If your Nest Thermostat is turned on but you can’t control it or it’s acting sluggish, try manually restarting it by turning the thermostat off and then back on again. If your Nest Thermostat is off and won’t turn on, take the thermostat off the base and charge it using a a USB charger plugged into the wall or a computer. 

IMPORTANT: Do not try to restart your thermostat while it’s still connected to a computer for charging. (They didn’t elaborate why, but if they say don’t do it, LISTEN TO THEM.) 

After about 10 minutes of charging, unhook the Nest Thermostat from the USB charger. If the unit has turned on while charging, shut it down and then turn it back on again, manually restarting the thermostat. Once it has completed the restart, plug it back in to complete charging. After about 60 minutes of charging, disconnect the Nest Thermostat and reconnect it to its base. 

You should be good to go at this point, but  if you’ve had enough and want to swap your thermostat, you can view our comparison of common thermostats.  

If you have attempted both of these processes and the Nest Thermostat is still giving you trouble, you will need to bring in reinforcements. Enter us! If Stevenson Service Experts set up your Nest Thermostat, please feel free to call us at 614-334-3192 or schedule an appointment online. 

And if encounter another error, like a warning from Nest that your furnace is shutting down, then your thermostat may not be the problem at all. You may need to call Stevenson Service Experts as one of Columbus‘s premier furnace experts to fix your unit.  

Also, do not let this matter concern you about your Nest’s reliability. By owning and properly using Nest, your thermostat is truly saving money for you daily. When set it up correctly, Nest intelligently learns your lifestyle, then adjusts your heating and cooling use to optimize energy savings every day, which typically results in payback within the first year. And, Nest is still one of the only thermostats under $300 on the market that does this. So don’t let one problem get you down. You were smart to invest in a Nest, because a smart thermostat is still one of the best investments in your home that you can make. 

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