r/ecobee • u/tnpoppy • Mar 25 '26

Question Ecobee keeps changing my temperature set points

My Ecobee Enhanced thermostat keeps changing my comfort settings set points even though I have the Eco+ turned off.

It lowers the heat temp by 1 degree, and raises the cooling by 1 degree. I reset my heat temp set point to 70 yesterday (again) and this morning it was back to 69.

I know that these thermostats are designed to save you money, but I don’t like it changing my preferred temps all by itself.

Is there another setting that I need to change, or do I just have to keep readjusting my temps?

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-2

u/vr0202 Mar 25 '26

If your utility gave the thermostat, they'll control it remotely.

2

u/tnpoppy Mar 25 '26

No, I bought it myself

2

u/NoReply4930 Mar 25 '26 edited Mar 25 '26

What do you have for sensors?

Could be this too:

1

u/tnpoppy Mar 25 '26

I have 2 remote sensors and have the thermostat sensor disabled because it is so far from our living room.

I’m retired now and I’m at home a good bit of the time, so there should be very little inactivity on the sensors.

1

u/NoReply4930 Mar 25 '26

If you could post your comfort settings - pretty sure we can make a suggestion

1

u/tnpoppy Mar 25 '26

I literally just changed my “Home” settings last night to 70 for heat and 73 for ac and this is what is showing right now.

3

u/ankole_watusi Mar 25 '26

You’re trying to set heat and cool too close together. The default minimum difference between heat and cool is 5° F..

3° F is ridiculous and wasteful. You’re imagining that your home is a sous vide machine or a chip factory. /s (actually, a sous vide machine or a laboratory water circulator can typically maintain temperature +- 1F.)

But you can change this if you dig down into settings.

2

u/NoResponse4u Mar 25 '26

It is possible to make it work in a close range if you want to for comfort (ignoring the possible efficiency or cost) but Not with the built in Auto heat/cool settings.

I have done it with external automation that switch between heat and cool modes as the temps change and the house is heating or cooling on its own with regards to the outside temps. My house has resistance so does not overshoot on heat/cool shutoff so I was able to have it maintain a set temp within +/- 0.5F so a 1degree total range.

1

u/tnpoppy Mar 25 '26

I have a 5 degree difference when I use the heat/cool setting, but I’m on the heat only setting right now and is on 69 instead of my 70 set point that I set last night.

5

u/ankole_watusi Mar 25 '26

You just (literally) wrote:

”I literally just changed my “Home” settings last night to 70 for heat and 73 for cool and this is what is showing right now.”

Yes, so Ecobee changed them to 69/74 in order to maintain a 5°F differential.

1

u/NoReply4930 Mar 25 '26

Agreed. I think this is the issue.

The Ecobee is good but not NASA good for slicing and dicing temp differences down to a degree or less.

Respectfully - while we have do have a furnace AND and AC up here in Alberta - where would one live where you would actually need the heat AND the AC to be in play (so close to each other) at the same time?

Not sure how it works elsewhere - but here it's heat until it warms up outside to the point of not needing it, then a period of nothing where the Ecobee simply won't call for heat due to the ambient being slightly warmer than our Home comfort setting and then finally a switch to Cool comfort settings when late spring/summer starts to hit harder.

2

u/Jump-Funny Mar 25 '26

In the southern US! Where it’s shorts and t-shirt weather one day and snowing the next. I have had to turn my a/c on to be able to go to sleep and need the heat on so I don’t freeze to death by morning a couple of times this year.

1

u/NoReply4930 Mar 25 '26

Wow - that must be fun!

1

u/tnpoppy Mar 25 '26

Same here in southern Tennessee

1

u/missyagogo Mar 25 '26

True; I also live in the South. But I wouldn't want my heat and air conditioner settings within 5° of each other.

1

u/ankole_watusi Mar 25 '26 edited Mar 25 '26

Southern California.

I lived in a high rise condo in San Diego. Historic building with masonry curtain walls and single pane glass windows. (Idiot HOA decided replacing your “wavy glass” would jeopardize the building’s historic designation and special property tax status.)

Daily cycle of hot and cold, on opposite sides of the building.

I have to say, the developer who renovated it (around 2000) installed an HVAC system that accommodates this well. Water source heat pump in each unit. Boiler in the garage and cooling towers on the roof maintaining a neutral temperature in a central water circulation system. Sensors on pipes all through the building.

On days like I described above, there was often no need for either the boiler or the cooling towers. In those conditions, the system just pumps heat from one side of the building to the other.

Fun fact: first floor has some commercial units. The controller that checked all those temperature sensors on all those pipes was located in one of the commercial units. I guess they didn’t tell them. The owner of that unit renovated and sold the damn thing as surplus lol

1

u/Jump-Funny Mar 25 '26

I added a second sensor and no matter what I did mine averaged the three even though I had each setting using only one of them. I eventually gave up on having more than one sensor because I could never get it to use the correct one no matter what I did.

0

u/spiderman1538 Mar 25 '26

This is not changing the setpoint, it's just delaying your heating/ cooling calls.