Smart Switch Advice - Bathroom Fans
So I recently bought Zooz switches for my place and didn't do enough research figuring out exactly what I needed. Bought mostly ZEN72 dimmers, some ZEN71 for my ceiling fans, and 1 ZEN35.
My bathroom fans are wired to both the light and fan in one wire and have dimmable LED's in them that I swapped from CFL bulbs at some point. So I bought ZEN72 dimmers for them, thinking I really want to be able to dim those for later at night. I now realize this wasn't a good idea, and bathroom fans also aren't supposed to be run on dimmers/ZEN72.
When I run them on 1% brightness - the LEDs dim nicely and the fan slows down consistently but on 1% runs low enough it cant be heard/might be off. It seems really smooth how it's working. So im bummed im not supposed to dim them, but i can accept that.
When I run at 100% brightness, the fan sounds totally normal.
My main question is a gut check - it will really still ruin the motor if i keep these on 100% and I should swap them out? Mostly just bummed because i dont have another use for the dimmable switches and cant return them
Second just looking for advice on what switch to get - given that a big part of my bathroom lighting is also on these fans, i was hoping to keep them smart to be able to turn them off easily.
I see many people just use timer switches for these, and I could live with that if that's the best approach here. Though id love a timer switch that's smart and ideally Zwave so everything is consistent, and i dont see one that Zooz makes.
I dont think humidity switches make as much sense given they are also tied to my lights.
I've looked into the job to separate the wiring for fan/light and it seems like more than im willing to take on.
Posted Jan 7, 2026, 3:03 PM UTC