Remote working has its perks, no doubt. You can work from anywhere in the world that has an internet connection and sitting in rush-hour traffic is a thing of the past, thankfully. Whether you’re working from a home office stateside, from a coffee shop in Asia as a digital nomad, or somewhere in-between, there are a few products and services that make your work life more convenient, efficient, and effective.

Hardware

Monitor Stand
Aside from a good laptop (which could be an entire article in itself), there are some things that help your productivity and comfort. Regardless of where you work, pay attention to ergonomics. Spending long days hunched over a laptop can cause long-term posture and alignment issues. Your older self will thank you for using a good laptop stand now. Many workers use docking stations when at home, but there are plenty of lightweight, packable stands for comfort on the go.

Keyboard/Mouse
With the stand, you’ll need a separate keyboard and mouse. Touchscreens and trackpads are fine for small tasks, but real work demands real gear. If you are just setting up a home office, a full-size keyboard is nice to have. If traveling, go for lightweight and portable, like a folding Bluetooth model. And mouses have come a long way, there are tiny ones that are accurate and powerful that travel well. Using both, you’re a far better worker with a proper setup.

Second Monitor
If you’re just settling into a new office, having a second monitor might feel like a luxury at first, but it will quickly become a necessity that you won’t want to live without. On the plus side, the old days of needing a clunky cord and a separate power source are long gone. Modern USB C-powered monitors are amazingly thin, lightweight, and portable. There are even have touchscreen-capable models. Once you have one, you won’t go back to just a single monitor.

Data/File Storage
There are two good options here, Cloud storage and external hard drives. And really, both should be in every remote worker’s quiver. Services like iCloud, Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, and Box are all cloud services which allow you to access your files from any device anywhere in the world.

When it comes to external hard drives, they are nice to have in case you’re offline, for use as a loaner, and for hard backups of files. SSD models, while more expensive than actual hard disks, are lightweight and tiny. They tend to be more expensive than their hard-disk counterparts, but they are worth the added cost for the extra portability. They’re also faster and more rugged since there are no moving parts, so you can toss them into a backpack and schlep them around the world worry free.

Headset
This may not be for everyone, but if you spend a significant amount of time on the phone, having a decent headset is a must. They’re not just for “As Seen on TV” phone operators anymore. A good headset lets other people know you’re engaged and filters distractions, whether it’s your dog barking or the background noise at the co-working spot. You’re almost certainly doing something else when on the phone, so they’re also the key to freeing up your hands so you can type.

Smart Office Assistant
Smart speakers like the Amazon Echo and Google Home have become the nucleus of the integrated office. You can text contacts or make phone calls just by saying, “dial Joe at ABC Corp.” Finding out where and when your next meeting is or managing all your reminders is as simple as asking your virtual assistant. By using a smart display (basically a smart speaker with an attached screen), you can pull up your calendar, participate in a video conference, and see your to-do list all with the same device. They’ll keep you focused by playing music, white noise, or soothing forest sounds as well.

Time Tracker
The world of the IoT is getting more helpful, more productive, and more accessible than ever. Remote workers are often collaborating on many tasks and projects at once, or they’re freelancers with multiple clients. Bosses want to know how you’re spending your day, and you want to know how many hours you spent on a particular project. Stop guessing how to fill out timesheets with Timeular's ZEI time keeper. It’s an eight-sided die that does the work for you. You assign each of your various tasks to a panel, place the die to that side and the timer starts. It tracks all your hours, fills out the sheets for you, and relays it to your boss if you want it to. It shows you a clear picture of how you spend your time. It’s perfect for keeping track of multiple tasks or billing separate clients, and it helps identify time-sinks and ways to increase your productivity.

The Rise of the Smart Office
These days, the only limit to what the IoT can do for you is your imagination. Connected lightbulbs could turn on and turn off automatically when you enter or leave the room. A Smart coffee maker could make your coffee exactly how you like it at 8:15 every morning. It saves you a precious few minutes every day which is good because you now have an 8-sided die on your desk telling your boss everything you do. Thermostats can monitor the temperature throughout the day, IoT-enabled printers are smart enough to automatically order toner when they need it. Even “dumb” devices can now be programmed with the help of Smart Plugs. All this adds up to saving both time and money, and it just makes working life a little easier.

Software
Virtual Private Network
Being location independent can mean many things. For some, it means working in the spare bedroom of their suburban home, but for others, it means working in the library or a coffee shop in a city. Or, if Instagram is to be believed, work can be from a hammock on the beach in Thailand. All that mobility is certainly freeing, but it can expose you and your business to potential security risks. Check your email once in an airport and you can be hacked. A VPN is an absolute must-have for anyone on the go. When it comes to VPNs, you get what you pay for. There are plenty of free VPN service providers out there. But, if security and anonymity are import to you and your business (and they should be), then paying for a VPN is worth its cost for the peace of mind.

Phone Service
Telecommuting doesn’t mean isolation. You still need to talk to prospects, customers, employees, and team members on the phone. If you’re not on the road full time, then getting business phone service is a smart choice. With three-way calling, conferencing, messaging, and call screening, you can run an efficient, organized ship, and look professional while doing it. And, when you’re traveling, call forwarding can seamlessly transfer a call to your cell.

If you’re on the road more than half the time, a VoIP phone service may be the way to go. It’s affordable, scalable, and works anywhere there’s an internet connection. And, when you make an outbound call, your phone number shows up on the recipient’s caller ID the same regardless of where you’re calling from. That’s especially nice if you don’t want to disclose that you’re not actually sitting in the office.

Apps That Keep You on Track
Just because you’re out of the office, doesn’t mean you have escaped distractions. Sure, you may no longer have co-workers stopping by to discuss that latest binge-worthy show on Netflix. But if you’re at home, you have your dog, kids, or a kitchen full of food to graze on. A coffee shop or a co-working space can be even more distracting. Then, there is the entire internet, a time-suck of cat GIFs and YouTube videos. Productivity apps like Freedom or RescueTime block apps or websites that you know pull your focus. You can set rules like “block Facebook and Twitter from 9 a.m. to noon every day.”

The flip side of productivity is too much focus. It can be easy to get in the zone and suddenly realize that it’s dark outside and you haven’t stood up for 6 hours. Stretchly is a free and open-source desktop app that reminds you to take a 20-second break every 10 minutes and a full five minutes every half hour. The times can be customized or skipped entirely.

Utilizing the hardware and software on this list may very well make you employee of the month. But don’t stop here, the smart home office of today and tomorrow will only continue to improve. As more people realize the joys and benefits of working from home and more companies allow telecommuting, we’ll all work better, more efficient, and more comfortably. And maybe, just maybe we’ve solved the traffic problem, too.