Aqara joins Works with Home Assistant

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We’re excited to announce that Aqara is bringing several of their devices to our Works with Home Assistant program. We know that Aqara is a brand that many in the community like to recommend for its solid options for Zigbee and Matter.

This will be the first partner to join since our recent update to the program, meaning it is the first to join certifying specific devices, making it much easier to see what will give you the best experience in Home Assistant. It will also be the first partner to use our “Works via Matter with Home Assistant” badge, giving some great options to use with Home Assistant’s industry-leading Matter support.

Matter materializes

Aqara has been an early adopter of Matter, and many of its new products support the standard, which is great for connecting to Home Assistant. Matter allows for local control by directly connecting devices to Home Assistant, keeping your smart home data in your home. Matter is a completely local IP-based protocol that leverages your existing Ethernet and Wi-Fi networks, but it can also use Thread, which many Aqara devices take advantage of. Thread devices can be directly connected to Home Assistant using a Connect ZBT-1, or can be connected to Home Assistant via an existing hub (Thread Border Router) you may already have from another smart home ecosystem, including the Aqara Hub M3.

One superpower of Matter compared to other standards is being able to control these devices with multiple different ecosystems simultaneously. For instance, an Aqara lock could be unlocked with a Home Assistant automation and then locked with a voice command directed to an Apple Homepod.

Devices joining the program

Aqara has had the following three devices Works with Home Assistant certified. All of which can be directly connected to Home Assistant without an account.

  • Motion and Light Sensor P2 - Matter over Thread battery-powered motion and lux sensor.
  • Door and Window Sensor P2 - Matter over Thread battery-powered cover sensor.
  • Smart Lock U200 - Matter over Thread battery-powered lock.

    We’re also testing the yet-to-be-launched Smart Lock U300, which we hope to see added soon.

    We have also certified a hub that makes it easy to connect an existing Aqara-based smart home to Home Assistant using Matter.

    • Hub M3 - It has many functions, but we have certified it as a Matter Bridge. This means you can use it to bridge your existing Aqara Zigbee devices to Matter. It can also act as a Thread Border Router for Home Assistant.

    If you have some Aqara products that are not listed above, rest assured that they will continue to work as they always have. The program is a way to clearly indicate which devices provide the best experience with Home Assistant. We’ve ensured this by testing these devices’ compatibility ourselves. We also get assurances from the brand that they will provide responsive support and maintenance, while being a positive brand in the Home Assistant community.

    Works with Home Assistant is now run by the non-profit Open Home Foundation, which means it is not a profit-making endeavor. It is about encouraging brands to go above and beyond in the Home Assistant community, and we’re excited to have Aqara join.

    When shopping for devices to connect to your home, we recommend first looking at our Works with Home Assistant partner’s products. These products always prioritize long-term support and local control.

    • This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://www.home-assistant.io/blog/2024/09/03/aqara-joins-works-with-home-assistant
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    This is fantastic news!

    Sorry if I’m stupid but, which 3 devices are certified?

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    The 3 devices are not mentioned in the blog

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    They didn’t make it in the forum post, but they’re in the linked blog:

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    Really wish they also cooperated on zigbee devices too, but I doubt they will.

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    Not sure why the forum import of the blog post failed. I have manually updated it and added the 3 devices.

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    I’m looking to buy the U200 so WWHA is great. Does the certification give any indication about what is actually available to see and control in HA?

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    I have the P2 motion sensor integrated with HA, I often get false motion detection (when there’s no one home) and the light sensor doesn’t go low enough to be useful. I also have a Zigbee Aqara motion sensor that works better and also has a temperature sensor

    8

    Great addition, Aqara is the go-to for a lot of devices!

    Seems like this is mostly for Matter devices, though. Perhaps Aqara will start respecting the ZigBee spec now instead of their non-standard implementation?

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    Sorry, but this is only a very very little step, not really useful and a little bit annoying.
    Anyone who has not read this post will expect all Aqara devices to be supported by Aqara joins Works with Home Assistant. And all of them will be disappointed.
    Sorry, but this announcement comes years too early. Aqara will need years to update a sufficient amount of devices.

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    @balloob will you also update your partner page with a list of certified devices or create a new device compatibility page or database?

    Tip is that Z-Wave JS already has an official device configuration reference database that could be re-used:

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    Wish they’d introduce Matter-based temperature and humidity sensors. They’re the only sensors left on Zigbee here in my home.

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    Really excited for this. I hope the soon add some lamps so we will be able to access animations from within HomeAssistant.

    Really impressed you guys got a brand like aqara on board. I hope they take their commitment seriously. Nevertheless, great news!!

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    I added my U200 to HA months ago but am now having issues with the lock status not updating to HA. Is there a github repo I can submit my problem to?

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    Great news! Congratulations to Guy and the team!

    15

    Very cool. Nice one on both sides.

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    16

    What about the U100? Hub E1? :pensive:

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    Yay! That us great news!

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    This is bizarre given that Aqara Support just told me to take a running jump when I reported that their overpriced T1M light fixture had a bug in when it randomly turns itself on every 3 hours.

    They said they don’t support Home Assistant. Buy a hub.

    Can anyone confirm if they will support devices connected directly? Or are they just peddling their hubs for sale. I’m still trying to get the quirks working for this damn light.

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    I am currently using the SONOFF Zigbee 3.0 USB dongle for ZHA. I also have several Aqara Fp2 presence detectors. These are currently integrated via Homekit. Does it then make sense to replace the SONOFF Zigbee 3.0 USB dongle with the ZBT-1? This can do Zigbee and also Thread/Matter

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    No, the solution for using Multi-PAN/multiprotocol (with Zigbee and Thread in active use concurrantly on the same radio) is deprecaded and no longer supported/maintained by Home Assistant’s developers, (though Silicon Labs is still working on improving that feature so might be picked up again in the future), so for now the recommendation is instead to always to use separate dedicated radios for Zigbee and Thread (i.e. Make sure to always use a separate dedicated Zigbee Coordinator adapter / USB dongle for Zigbee). Read the FAQ here:

    And more details here:

    What is the current state of multiprotocol support?

    Multiprotocol will remain an experimental feature and is not recommended for use.

    When we launched this device, we announced our intent to release firmware supporting multiprotocol, which allows the device’s Silicon Labs chip to connect to both Zigbee and Thread networks with one radio.

    This experimental firmware has been available since December 2022. Through extensive testing, we have found that although it works in some circumstances, it has technical limitations that lead to a worse user experience. We now do not recommend using this firmware, and it will be experimental for the foreseeable future. Instead, we will focus on making sure the dedicated Zigbee and Thread firmwares for Home Assistant Connect ZBT-1 deliver the best experience to users.

    If you currently have the multiprotocol firmware installed but don’t actively use it to connect to Thread devices, we recommend that you disable multiprotocol.

    Nothing changes for current users of the multiprotocol firmware who are happy with their experience. The experimental multiprotocol firmware will remain available, but we will not recommend it to new users.

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