{"id":38367,"date":"2026-03-12T07:17:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-12T07:17:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/38367\/"},"modified":"2026-03-12T07:17:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-12T07:17:16","slug":"you-cant-replace-the-battery-in-legos-smart-bricks-and-many-of-its-sensors-arent-active-yet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/38367\/","title":{"rendered":"You can\u2019t replace the battery in Lego\u2019s Smart Bricks \u2014 and many of its sensors aren\u2019t active yet"},"content":{"rendered":"

The first Lego Smart Brick sets, based on Star Wars, aren\u2019t quite what my kids and I hoped<\/a>, and I suspect much of that\u2019s down to programming. But the Smart Bricks may also have some technical limitations out of the gate. The first sets don\u2019t ship with a number of their sensors enabled, including the sound-detecting microphone, the ambient light sensor, fine distance measurement<\/a>, position, and orientation. The Lego Group tells us that \u201call technology is present, some bits are just not enabled in the current sets.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are more sensors that will be unlocked with future products,\u201d Lego Smart Brick sound designer Elysha Zaide explained on a recent livestream<\/a>, citing ambient light, position, and orientation as missing out of the gate. It\u2019s possible these features will require a software update to unlock: Lego\u2019s Smart Brick app<\/a> explains that the brick\u2019s built-in microphone is currently disabled and will need an update if that changes.<\/p>\n

The Smart Bricks do have other working sensors. The NFC reader registers nearby Smart Tiles through as many as seven Lego plates (roughly 22mm), I tested, and almost every interaction uses motion sensing. The color sensor detects red, green, and blue objects held up to the side of the Smart Brick when it\u2019s flashing its LED. There\u2019s also one basic multi-brick interaction \u2014 when one starfighter or turret blasts, all others will register a \u201chit\u201d and eventually \u201cexplode.\u201d<\/p>\n

But that\u2019s the only multi-brick interaction for now, Lego comms manager Jack Rankin confirms to The Verge; even a two-brick lightsaber battle doesn\u2019t currently sync up those two bricks. In the company\u2019s demos at CES (one of which I saved for posterity<\/a>), bricks could wirelessly connect to each other to share colors, sync up sounds, and play various games.<\/p>\n

The other thing Lego\u2019s app reveals is how carefully it protects the Smart Brick\u2019s tiny battery from draining too fast. The Smart Brick only offers around 45 minutes of active play, and puts itself to sleep within three minutes if it\u2019s idle. (You shake it to wake it again.) But it\u2019ll also go into a deep sleep after 13 hours; you have to put it on its wireless charger, just for a moment, to pull it out of deep sleep.<\/p>\n

The batteries are truly tiny<\/a> \u2014 just 45mAh, compared to 4,000mAh in my Samsung Galaxy S25 phone \u2014 and they\u2019re not user replaceable. As you can see in JerryRigEverything\u2019s destructive teardown<\/a>, it\u2019s difficult to even get at the battery without going through thin, hair-like antennas. Lego\u2019s instruction manuals recommend safely disposing of the entire brick, and not in your normal trash.<\/p>\n

For another look inside the Smart Brick, check out these StoneWars X-rays<\/a>. Also, Marcin Ruszkiewicz has discovered it\u2019s already possible to clone Lego\u2019s NFC-based Smart Tags, and possibly let people create their own after the community analyzes their encryption, at this GitHub page<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Update, March 11th: Added clarification from The Lego Group.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The first Lego Smart Brick sets, based on Star Wars, aren\u2019t quite what my kids and I hoped,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":38368,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6050],"tags":[16379,4248,6051,38,595,10146],"class_list":{"0":"post-38367","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-lego","8":"tag-gadgets","9":"tag-lego","10":"tag-lego-group","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-tech","13":"tag-toys"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/116214985275436009","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38367"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38367\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38368"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}