Making traditional light switches smart

Re:Making traditional light switches smart by rootusrootus on Wednesday May 04, 2022 @01:49PM (#31263639)

Seems like overkill. His assertion about smart switches is incorrect. I have a house full of smart switches that don't connect to the cloud. They are standalone, but will take commands from Home Assistant. If HA goes down, the switch never even knows, it's still just a light switch.

This is how -all- of my home automation works. The thermostat can be controlled via HA, but it's just a thermostat and works 100% normally without HA. The deadbolts? I can see their status in HA, I can tell them to lock, but they still just have a twist knob on the inside and a key (in addition to a keypad) on the outside, so they can be used just like any other deadbolt. Garage door openers, same deal.

I do agree that using something like Hue to turn lights on/off isn't a great idea.

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Re:Making traditional light switches smart by eps on Thursday May 05, 2022 @02:32AM (#31270255)

It's not an overkill if you want to keep existing switches or automate just some of them and not have a potpourri on your walls.

Shellies are also noticeably cheaper.

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Re:Making traditional light switches smart by cylentwolf on Wednesday May 04, 2022 @02:54PM (#31264399)

what product did you use for the smart switches?

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Re:Making traditional light switches smart by luma on Wednesday May 04, 2022 @02:57PM (#31264442)

Any ZigBee or Z-Wave smart switches will be 100% local and just about anything you buy should be supported by Home Assistant.

Tested compatible Z-Wave device database: https://devices.zwave-js.io/ Same, but for ZigBee: https://www.zigbee2mqtt.io/supported-devices/

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Re:Making traditional light switches smart by stavros on Wednesday May 04, 2022 @03:22PM (#31264718)

Don't buy anything that isn't Zigbee (or, I guess, Z-wave). Wi-Fi is much too heavy and insecure for smart home stuff, Zigbee has a ton of features you'll want (much simpler protocol, automatic repeaters, etc etc).

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Re:Making traditional light switches smart by JamesSwift on Wednesday May 04, 2022 @03:06PM (#31264537)

More high-level Zigbee compatibility site: https://zigbee.blakadder.com

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Re:Making traditional light switches smart by rootusrootus on Wednesday May 04, 2022 @04:45PM (#31265628)

All of my smart switches are Jasco (aka GE) Z-wave switches.

As I buy other HA toys, I've been getting Zigbee when I can. It has been less hassle to do the device adoption process and the USB dongle I use for Home Assistant supports both Z-Wave and Zigbee simultaneously.

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