All the terms above refer to the piece of hardware that becomes the brain of your smart home. This product type can come in many forms. Think of a hub like your Wi-Fi router. Your router provides Wi-Fi within your home. A Z-Wave smart hub/gateway/controller provides the Z-Wave functionality within your smart home and controls the commands you want it execute. A smart hub comes in many forms – it could be as simple as an alarm panel used for your home security, a stand-alone hub device, a thermostat, or more. The most common form is a stand-alone hub.