What You Actually Need to Know Before Opening the Box
The My Touch Smart Timer 26898 is a Wi-Fi-controlled programmable relay timer that plugs into a standard wall outlet. It's designed for lamps, small appliances, holiday lights, and similar loads up to 15 amps resistive. The unit itself is unremarkable. What makes it worth your time or your frustration depends entirely on how you plan to use it and whether you understand its actual limitations before you invest in it. I've had three of these in various setups over the last two years. They work fine for simple tasks like turning a coffee maker on at 6:30 AM or cycling outdoor string lights. They are not suitable for any application where uptime matters, because the companion app is genuinely unreliable and the device will occasionally drop off your network without warning. When I first set one up for automating a space heater, it disconnected every third day at random intervals. Troubleshooting that took me about an hour before I accepted it as normal behavior and moved the device to something less critical.
My Touch Smart Timer 26898 Instructions
Setting up the hardware takes about five minutes if you already have the app installed and your phone is on 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi. This last detail matters because the device does not support 5 GHz networks, and the pairing process will silently fail if you attempt it on the wrong band. Most routers broadcast both, so check your phone's Wi-Fi settings before you begin. Step 1: Download the Smart Life or Tuya Smart app from your device's app store. These are the two apps the timer supports natively. I recommend Smart Life because it has fewer bloat features, but either one works identically for basic scheduling. Step 2: Create an account or log in. This step is straightforward and usually takes under two minutes.
Step 3: Press and hold the physical button on the front of the timer for about five seconds until the LED indicator starts blinking rapidly in blue. This puts the device into pairing mode. The manual describes this as "fast blinking," which is not very precise, so watch for the light to change from a steady blue to a rapid pulse. If it blinks slowly instead, you haven't held the button long enough. Step 4: Open the app and tap the plus button to add a device. Select "Switch" or "Timer" from the categories, then choose "Smart Timer" when prompted. The app will ask for your Wi-Fi credentials. Enter the 2.4 GHz network password and confirm. The app should detect the device within thirty seconds and walk you through naming it. Step 5: Once paired, go into the device settings and create your first schedule. Tap "Timer" or "Schedule," then set the start time, end time, and repeat pattern. The interface lets you choose between one-time events, daily repetition, or custom day-of-week patterns. Save the schedule and test it by manually toggling the relay on and off to confirm the device responds.
Get the Full Details
I encountered a specific issue that almost made me return the unit. After setting up a complex weekly schedule across seven days with different on/off times, the timer would occasionally skip a programmed transition and run the wrong sequence for the next 24 hours. I traced this to the "cycle mode" setting, which I had left on the default repeated loop rather than switching to a fixed schedule. Changing the mode to "Fixed" resolved the problem entirely. This is not obvious from the app interface, and the labels are ambiguous enough that you could spend 20 minutes second-guessing yourself before finding it. The schedules themselves are stored locally on the device, which is one of the few advantages this timer has over cheaper competitors. If your internet goes down, your existing schedules continue to run. However, you cannot edit or add schedules while offline, and any changes you make will sync only when the connection is restored. I learned this when a router reboot took the device offline for six hours, and I assumed my new schedule had been applied when it actually had not. Resetting the device requires holding the front button for ten full seconds until the LED flashes red twice. This clears all schedules and Wi-Fi credentials and returns the unit to factory defaults. I do this roughly once every six months as a maintenance step, and it usually resolves whatever glitch has accumulated over time.
There are several things the 26898 cannot do that the marketing materials might imply. It cannot integrate with voice assistants without going through the Smart Life app bridge, so if you want Alexa or Google Home control you need to link the account manually in those respective apps. It does not support energy monitoring, so you cannot see how much power your connected device is drawing. It does not have a battery backup, meaning a power outage will clear your current schedule unless you recreate it manually afterward. And the maximum load is 15 amps at 120V, which means anything above roughly 1,800 watts will damage the relay inside. A single space heater on high is fine. Two space heaters on the same outlet through a splitter is not. If you need something more reliable for critical applications, a hardwired smart switch like those from Lutron or a dedicated programmable timer like the Elcon IT89T series will cost more but will not lose schedules during network disruptions. For casual use around the house, the 26898 does what it claims to do without requiring any technical knowledge beyond following the setup steps above. The instruction manual that ships with the device is adequate but generic, and it omits the cycle mode detail that tripped me up. I found the relevant information buried in the Smart Life app's built-in help section, which is not referenced anywhere in the printed documentation. If you are stuck on a problem that the manual does not address, checking the in-app help or searching the Tuya developer forums is usually faster than waiting for a response from customer support.
Overall, the My Touch Smart Timer 26898 is a functional budget device that works well if you keep its limitations in mind. Set it up on 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi, verify your schedule mode is correct before relying on it, and do not use it for anything that requires guaranteed uptime. Done.
