Govee Floor Lamp 2 Review: The Immersive, Smart Lighting Tower

The Govee Floor Lamp 2 is the Matter-compatible successor to the original Govee Lyra; it's brighter, better, and boasts some really fun features. It retails for $150, but you’ll find frequent deals. It’s only available in black, and it's the smaller sibling of the Govee Floor Lamp 2 Pro (which we’ll also be taking a look in the near future once Matter support is added).

What's improved on the Floor Lamp 2?

Before we get into it, let’s briefly compare this new Floor Lamp 2 to the original and hugely successful Lyra Floor Lamp, as there are a couple of changes worth mentioning.

The first is Matter support, meaning you can control some basic functionality of the Floor Lamp 2 through Apple HomeKit, Google Home and Amazon Alexa, or all three at once. However, only a limited set of features are exposed through the Matter API. 

The second is a little visual flair in the base: a ring of LEDs can be controlled separately from the main light. It's not a huge feature, and some people may even want to disable it, but in the right situation, it can look neat. 

Lastly, it’s brighter, at 1725 lumens vs the original 1500.

What is RGBICWW?

The Govee Floor Lamp 2 uses an RGBICWW LED arrangement, and if that's just a bunch of letters to you, let me explain briefly.

RGB means it can do red, green, and blue, or any combination thereof, for 16 million possible colors.

IC means "integrated circuit", as in, each LED or a small segment of LEDs has it's own controller chip. This allows you to use multiple colors at once rather than just the whole tower showing the exact same color; you could have a rainbow or a gradient, or leave parts of the strip off.

The WW bit means white and warm white are produced separately from the RGB LEDs. Cheaper lighting fixtures typically combine the red, green, and blue channels to produce an unsatisfying white. The Govee Floor Lamp 2 includes separate pure and warm white LEDs to give you bright shades of white to suit your preference or time of day.

Some construction needed

Considering this is a 60-inch tall floor lamp in a reasonably small box, there is a little construction to do. You're supplied with a set of screws and a screwdriver, as well as some joining plates, which you use to join the four aluminum profile sections onto the base. 

Once those are secure, you should connect up the flexible LED strip to the wire that's hanging out of the base, and gently shove the wiring back into the base. Then push the silicone into the profile sections. I’d suggest doing both ends first so you dont end up with excess or a bit missing, then finish up the middle bits. 

You also get a remote control and magnetic plate, which can be push-fit to anywhere along the tower. This features a power button, single color and white/ warm white modes, brightness +/-, and audio-reactive music modes. But for dynamic scenes and the full feature set, you should download the Govee Home app. Just tap the + button in the top right of the app and it should automatically locate the Floor Lamp 2 using Bluetooth. During setup, you should add your Wi-Fi details. 

Controlling the Floor Lamp 2 with Matter

There is no Matter pairing code provided in the box; instead, you'll need to add it to the Govee Home app first, then go into settings. Here, you'll find a QR code and numerical pairing code shown on screen, but annoyingly, you won't be able to scan the code from the phone you're using, and the numerical code can't be copied from within the app.

Using two smartphones is an option, but I found it was easy enough to take a screenshot, then use my iPhone's text recognition to copy the number and proceed with the usual Matter device steps. (How to add a Matter device to Apple Home / Google Home). UPDATE: A viewer pointed out that there's actually a small tag on the power cable with the Matter code printed there. 

As ever, the control you're given over Matter is very limited: on/off, brightness, and uniform color selection. That's because Matter is designed to support all colored lighting devices with a one-size-fits-all specification. This is the same as the Govee Neon Rope Light 2 , or a Philips Hue smart bulb.

Matter is great for quickly turning something on or off, but it should always be used in conjunction with the manufacturer's smartphone app, not as a replacement for it.

Using the Govee Home app

The Govee Home app has grown in features significantly over the years, and can feel a little bloated at times. However, it's worth taking your time to familiarize yourself with it, as the interface is nearly identical for any other Govee lighting products that you add to your system (and you'll definitely want more). 

Scroll down to find the main four control methods. From left to right:

• Music is where you'll find a handful of sound-reactive scenes which can use the microphone built-in the floor lamp. This music modes only affect the Floor Lamp 2, however; if you have more than one DreamView compatible light, you should use the DreamView Music mode, detailed later in this review. 
• Color lets you paint segments of the light, including the ring on the base. On the advanced tab, you can set your creations to move as well. 
• Scene contains around a hundred dynamic lighting styles to suit festivals, nature, life events, relaxation, and more. You might find a few favorites, but there's no way to pare the list down. Scene modes are remembered the next time you turn on the Floor Lamp 2, as long as you don't cut the power at the plug. 
• DIY is similar to the advanced tab of color mode. Select a pattern type, tweak the parameters (like animation speed), and choose a set of colors. This is about as complex as the app gets, but if you have a specific effect in mind and can't find something in the library, this is where you'll need to make it. Once created, you can even make your effect public for others to use. 

But that's only scratching the surface of the features offered. Oddly, you need to navigate back to the home screen of the Govee Home app to find other user's creations; it's the second icon along at the bottom (the earth; "Explore").

DreamView

One of the standout features of Govee lighting is DreamView, which is essentially a way to group lights together and have them act in a coherent way. However, DreamView encompasses a few different systems. 

The first is Music DreamView. This is the same as dynamic music-reactive modes, but applied across multiple lights. To use this, you'll need one Govee light to act as a controller (or, you can buy a separate Music DreamView control box). Most Govee lights are now DreamView compatible, meaning they can be added to a DreamView system, but aren't capable of being a controller themselves. However, the Floor Lamp 2 can be a Music DreamView controller. From the Floor Lamp 2 main control page, select the top option in the list to get started; on the next screen you can add other devices, and choose which lighting scene to use. Interestingly, some of these go beyond simply replicating the effect on every light; some scenes will bounce beats around each device in turn. 

Then there's Movie DreamView. The Floor Lamp 2 doesn’t offer a Movie DreamView mode itself, of course, because it doesn’t have a camera or know what’s showing on your monitor, but the free Govee Desktop app for PC can act as the controller. You'll need to enable LAN control from the settings of the Floor Lamp 2, then it should be visible over the network on the desktop app. Just match up the segments to the location around your monitor, and anything displayed on-screen will be extended to the light. For TV and movies, the Govee Backlight 3 Lite is also a great option, which uses a webcam to analyze the TV output without hijacking the HDMI signal. 

If you have a room full of Govee lighting, the DreamView modes are incredible. For gamers, it's also compatible with Razer Chroma. 

What could be better?

The Floor Lamp 2 could benefit from being just a little heavier, perhaps because the base is acrylic, not metal or ceramic. I found it wasn't stable on deep carpets; I needed to squish it down to stop it falling over, and even then, the slightest knock from a wagging tail would topple it. On wooden floors, tiles, or short carpets, this isn't an issue, but it might be a concern if you have creatures or inquisitive small hands.

It also only comes in black, which might not suit your decor, and I don't think the light ring on the base adds much value to the overall effect. It can be turned off in the app, but it returns again if you use Matter or the main power button. It's a bit of unique visual flair, but it complicates the app interface and probably wasn’t needed.

Should you buy the Govee Floor Lamp 2?

As a package, the Floor Lamp 2 is a fantastic addition to the Govee line—especially for people who want to take advantage of Matter and DreamView features without destructively mounting lights to their walls. Alone, it offers some neat party lighting or just a subdued ambiance, but the real power comes when it combines it with other Govee fixtures in an immersive DreamView system.