It feels like my comment on the Cartoons topic.... If you get blinds involved... $$$ will be involved and you just have to accept that fact.... It really depends on the impact the blinds have on your life and the impact the automation will have...
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I will say it was far cheaper when we got our custom kitchen roman shade at blinds.com to add a 3rd party motor (am43) then it would have been to get something like zebra blinds or iblinds.com automated shades. I mean those companies charge out the yin yang...
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Most things in my house are decided by committee, but automating our blinds was a good idea nonetheless 
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My wife and I often have different preferences when it comes to having shades up/down at various times of the day/night.
In general, having most shades go up automatically in the morning, and down again in the evening, works for both of us. And then the ability to control via dashboard or voice assistant is convenient at times as well.
I also need to add an automation for our bedroom, which gets a lot of Sun exposure in the afternoons and forces the mini-split a/c in that room to work harder than it should.
I went with one of Lutron’s shade lines, which I’ll acknowledge definitely requires some disposable income. But they are extremely high quality, like most things Lutron makes, and I expect them to last a very long time.
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Exactly why I chose to go with iBlinds. The new house already had new dumb blinds and the cost to replace brand new blinds with plenty of life left was not worth it in my mind at the time. But I caught the iBlind Black Friday Sale and put in 6 motors for the price of 1 automated blind. The plus in my mind was price as well as if a motor fails the whole blind doesn't have to be replaced or hope that you can get a replacement part/motor from the company which I am sure is not cheap. The wife actually asked for them to be automated because she ran around the house opening, adjusting, closing blinds (when the wife asks for automation you must jump all over it 
). Now that I have them, I love them. Movie Time, all the blinds close to cut down on TV glare, morning all blinds open, afternoon blinds tilt to help block the sunny side of the house and keeping rooms cooler, sunset front blinds close so I am not in a fishbowl, etc. Any reason you have to touch your blinds can be automated.
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Currently I have either faux wood blinds from Menards (living room and kitchen), or insulated cellular shades (bedrooms). I think I paid $40 or so each nearly a decade ago for them, so I have probably about $350 in blinds for the whole house? I also have drapes from Ikea on most windows, so maybe all said and done $1000 for both?
For my modest working class house I wouldn't even consider blinds that cost many hundreds if not thousands of dollars each, that would be overkill. I don't play that game of having to be better than everyone. That said, I am considering purchasing the Ikea smart shades, they are relatively inexpensive. If they last a decade I would be happy with that. I would be OK if they even lasted 5-6 years because by then I probably would be painting and redecorating anyway, (last painted 5 or so years ago) and it would be time for something new.
I want to do just a couple windows with blinds, my living room window faces South, and it gets hot in there during Summer days even here in Michigan. With paying over $0.20 per KWH for crazy expensive electricity during peak hours, I try to save however I can. I would bring up blinds in AM, and close or partially close at Noon or so. I would re-open them later in the afternoon when the sun was again out of view, and close at night.
In the Winter at night the windows feel cold even though I have good windows. I twould be nice to have blinds up in the daytime to capture solar energy, and close at night to keep warmth in.
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No blinds. Only two curtains and just one of those is automated using these motors and this driver.
Automating the living room picture window curtain set me back about $130. Most automations are based on sunrise, sunset, and presence. I must have set up voice commands, also, because my wife asked Alexa to close just one side and it worked. Happy spouse, happy house.
Would I do this for all of the windows? No way. I could make a case for a few, though.
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Ohh, interesting! I hadn't seen motors for those ring-type curtains. That is the style of the Ikea drapes that I have.
This reminds me of when remote control ceiling fans were first introduced. I wondered who would be so lazy as to not get out of the bed/recliner to adjust the speed.
Fast forward about 15 years. I have 5 smart ceiling fans with the KOF module, along with a myriad of switches, sensors, and outlets in addition to my 12 IKEA Fyrtur blinds.
Plastic gears are fine if the design is robust. My shades close at sunset, the shades on the west side open to 55% at sunrise. The shades on the east side of the house open to 55% at noon when the sun is above the house. The blinds on the west side of the house close to 33% 2 hours before sunset. At sunset they all close.
This keeps the heat load at a minimum, stopping the sun from heating the carpeting on the east side of the house.
IKEA blinds are less expensive than most brands. Biggest complaint I have read is they are noisy. Perhaps if all 4 blinds in the living room were commanded all at the same time, but the blind is usually moving for less than 30 seconds.
The motor housing is the same no matter the width of the blind. The blind assembly can be cut to fit a window exactly with just a utility knife, hacksaw, marker, tape measure, and patience.
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I fit in with the rest of the crowd. Mix of iBlinds V2 and V3.
I have 5 windows facing SW. In the winter I have the blinds open at an angle that gathers as much sun as possible. In the summer when the house gets up to "door open" temp the blinds open to 50% to stop any direct heating. At Evening they close for privacy and Morning they open again, depending on the time of year and internal temp.
My downstairs blinds all close when the TV is turned on to quash reflections and open after the TV turns off - if it's still Day.
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Zebra appears to no longer be in business:
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My smart blondes are one of the best purchases I've ever made. I only have them outfit with one room which is the living room with the TVs.
I sit down on the couch and I notice glare on the TV coming from the windows. Last thing I want to do is get up and close the blinds, I'm lazy. Just tell Alexa to close them and my room is dark in 15 seconds. Worth it.
Just like when I forgot to turn the lights off in the garage and it's night time and I peek out the window and I can see them on 100 feet away. Just tell Alexa to shut off the garage lights. Worth it.
Some people have different wants and needs than you. I like to be able to turn my air compressor on from the house so It's full once I get it to the garage and I don't have to listen to it pump up.
It's the little things....
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The reasons I have not done this.
My need level: low
My want level: medium
My willingness to spend the money: low
If we get new blinds/shades, I’ll spend the extra dough for the automation, especially since our good friends own a blind business and I would want to give them the most profit for the job possible and credit with their vendors.
New windows are our next priority. It’s a house, so I expect one expense to trigger another 
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Isn't that against the law in most countries?
Also, where did you find a smart one?
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I converted some of my standard blinds into smart blinds. I documented the entire process here: GitHub - joelwetzel/Hubitat-MQTT-SmartBlinds: Hubitat driver and NodeMCU (ESP8266) firmware for smart blinds
(Not so much for other people. I documented it for my future self, if I decide to convert some more. And since my future self is forgetful, I wrote it up as if writing for a stranger.)
My reason: I have an office in my attic. It's a finished attic, but it is up at the top of the house, and heat rises. It has two windows that get a LOT of sunlight in the morning. I automated the shades on them, and then created a rule that uses a brightness sensor to close them when it gets too bright, and reopen them later when the sun has moved on.
Result: In the morning, instead of being 8 degrees F warmer than the rest of the house, the office is now only 1 degree F warmer than the rest of the house.
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Ha. Aren't blondes a bit out of vogue nowadays? Then again, for the most part I took whatever was available at the time.
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Aren't blondes a bit out of vogue nowadays
no!
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30 quid for a zigbee pull chain motor to convert dumb blinds to smart.
Why?
Automatic closing to stop my kitchen becoming an oven when the sun beats through.
Fun.
I posted this elsewhere but I just stumbled across these. Anyone own them or have any info on them? I think it's the cheapest zigbee blind I've seen at $100.
https://www.amazon.com/Astomi-Rechargeable-Compatible-Customized-Vinyl-Pure/dp/B0B5DL5DM3
My wife is a natural blonde. She is a very intelligent woman, having worked in the medical, legal, and retail fields. Mainly people like Marilyn Monroe and Jane Mansfield reinforced the ‘dumb blonde’ stereotype.
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