Best alarm clocks: Modern, retro, digital and sunrise light wake up calls

This is the Silicon Valley of alarm clocks. At first it seems like a kitschy black bar with an ironic ultra-blocky display, like some sort of ticker tape ad board.But the LaMetric Time is a lot more. It’s a smart alarm clock you can tool up with micro apps, from your phone. It can run off the BBC News headlines, your Twitter follower count, play Spotify or internet radio. Overkill for an alarm clock? Maybe, but it’s a great fit for a nerdy-and-proud bedroom.

Ditch the phone for better sleep! The Loftie is a stylish digital detox tool featuring a two-phase alarm that gently coaxes you awake, and offers meditations and soundscapes to help you drift off. There's also a low-level night light to help you find your glasses as you pop out of the covers for a midnight pee. It keeps your device in the other room, breaking the nightly scroll cycle for deeper rest and brighter mornings. Great — but the optional subscription add-on, offering even more sounds and meditation options is priced a bit steeply.

At first glance this might look like the most boring alarm clock you can possibly imagine. It’s almost all-black. There’s not a hint of retro and it ain’t exactly cute.However, this is just about the purest alarm clock you can get. Its looks are minimalist, and as it uses RF wireless timekeeping you know the time is right, all the time. And the reverse LCD display is clearer to read in the day, and a little less glow-happy at night. Its pop-up snooze button is neat too. But, beware, it’s a bleep alarm only.

Clocky might well be the most annoying alarm clock you ever laid hands on - but at the same time, it might just save your job. Ideal for early risers who can't keep their fingers off the snooze button, Clocky's ability to flee from your bedside table is, quite honestly, remarkable. Two large wheels make it a mobile machine, and with a host of colour options, there's a clock to suit every taste.

This is the smaller, more focused version of the Pure Siesta Home. It doesn’t want to be a hi-fi, just an alarm clock.However, it sounds a lot better than most and still has a DAB tuner. You also get Bluetooth, Pure’s brilliant auto-dimming display, a phone charging USB socket and an all-important snooze button.

A wake-up light can make you feel much less groggy in the morning. It’s a killer alarm clock for those winter months when you wake in the dark, and head home from work in the dark too. Just reading that sentence is depressing enough.The Bodyclock Luxe 750D is Lumie’s top-end wake-up alarm clock. It offers a smooth rising light level before you wake, emulating the sunrise, and has a DAB+ tuner and Bluetooth. A USB port lets you charge your phone too.If the 750D is way out of your budget, take a look at the Lumie Bodyclock Starter 30, the entry-level model. It has the light, but you have to wake up to a harsh beep.

OK, so you might want to buy an Amazon Echo Show 5 or Spot if you’re after the smartest alarm clock around. But Lenovo offers the rival Google digital assistant and a top layer of software that makes sure the Smart Clock feels like an alarm clock rather than a bedside computer.It can play music, show you the day’s appointments, file voice notes using the internal mics and control your smart lights. You can literally ask it to switch off your lights (if you have LIFX or Hue smart light bulbs in your bedroom, anyway).