Beginner question on wall mounted light switches, dimmers and fan switches

Hardware
1

Context

I’m new to Home Assistant and have a question on wall mounted light and fan switches. We are building a house that will have around four fans and 34 light switches of several configurations including, single pole, single pole dual switch, 3-way-dimmer.

Requirements

The specific requirements are:

  1. As it is a new construction, we will like it to be all consistent, which probably means using a single vendor (Leviton, Lutron, etc.).
  2. For the same reason, I prefer a switch that requires neutral.
  3. Type of switches:
    • smart single pole switches
    • smart single pole dimmer switches
    • smart single pole dual switches
    • smart single pole dual dimmer switches
    • smart 3-way dimmer switches
    • smart fan switches
  4. The switches must communicate over Z-Wave, ZigBee, or Matter with HA (or a hub connected to HA). They should not require a WiFi network and certainly should not require cloud connectivity. This location has very bad Internet connectivity, but most important, I want to maintain HA and its data local without Internet connection.
  5. The switches should be black to keep the wife happy. This is probably the easier requirement to meet, but should not forget about it.
  6. We do not need a phone app or Alexa, Siri, etc. The device may have those capabilities, but we are not planning to use it. In the future, if the internet connection improves, we plan to use HA mobile app.

Comments

Having two dimmers in a single gang (single pole dual switch) is the most difficult requirement (MOES ZigBee seems to be the only switch capable of this). The reason, been that I need to limit the wall boxes to maximum 3 gangs. Otherwise, I will need boxed for 4 and 5 gangs, which we don’t want.

Based on those requirements, I have been searching for a solution. So far, I have looked at Lutron, Levitron, MOES, Zooz, Sonoff, Enbrighten, Insteon, Inovelly (insane prices), and Wyze. I may be missing something or it may be that I need to relax my requirement of a single brand. But even under that relaxed condition, I’m unable to find the set of switches to meet my requirements.

MOES ZigBee comes close, but does not seems to have a, non-WiFi, fan switch, and the 3-way dimmers don’t use neutral (not a big deal, but nevertheless). But more important, it requires a “Tuya MOES ZigBee gateway” that seems to use a cloud service. The manual for the Moes’ ZigBee Multi-gang Smart Light Dimmer Switch requires to install the Smart Life App and create an account. So, that does not works for me.

Questions

My questions are the following:

  1. Can MOES ZigBee be connected locally to HA without a cloud connection (or account)?
  2. If so, what are the experiences with MOES?
  3. Is there any vendor that can meet my requirements? Am I missing something? Like other products or may be I’m reading the specs wrong.
  4. Which other vendors should look at?

Any suggestions are welcome.

2

In my new house I’m using these UltraPro Zwave single pole single switches and dimmers. They support up to 4 addons for a max of “5 ways.” However, I don’t have to use dual switches.

3

Yes for the zigbee ones, you can just pair directly with zigbee coordinator using zigbee2mqtt like the sonoff usb stick.
You only need to deal with tuya cloud account when using their wifi devices (which you can still replace the firmware with open source ones like esphome)

They’re just another OEM for tuya (like zemismart), i have no issues with their devices so far.

4

What geography. You mentioned everything else. Switching means power requirements. Which vary by region.

Im Northamerica. Most of my personal install are GE/Jasco and they just work (if you exclude my old 12xxx Jascos before the Jasco redesign)

I also use Zooz, Inovelli and Graeber/springs shades (all ZWave)

I back haul the zigbee mesh with Jasco zigbee wall outlets to build the powered mesh and use sengled for lighting (i do not like my bulbs to repeat signals - people turn them off)

If I were building new again I’d probably also consider Lutron Caserta devices - they’re pricey but people with the system love it. It’s built like a tank.

I will not use any Tuya anything - even the zigbee stuff. Nuances between manufacturers on Zigbee causing routing issues has been too problematic for me so I stick to a few known manufacturers to try to avoid that.

I would get wifi devices - but only matter over wifi devices.

Some use esp32 based switching flashed with esphome which is also locally controlled so I’m fine using anything in that space. If you do this you need to make sure your wifi network is solid. (new build - reccommend WiFi6 or WiFi6e capable network gear)

Unsolicited advice…

Run lo voltage wire. Everywhere if i built new ID be running 4 conductor wire to every window (motor blinds) and network jacks on every wall. Yes still, if I can get something off wifi and wired I will. Especially because I can use PoE for more than a phone.

Also finally consider a smart electric panel if you’re doing a new build. You only replace the panel if something is seriously wrong so this is likely the only time such a consideration makes financial sense. (it’s appropriately $2-3KUSD more than standard panels… IF you sub them in the new build because they don’t take any more than a standard panel to install… But a retrofit well. Let’s just say financing is available and leave it at that…). The panels are the ‘cheap’ part… If that’s something for you this is the time you consider it. Else you wait for a major event like a freak snowstorm in Texas destroying your electric panel before you get the chance to decide again.

Edit: and when you are considering your purchase - when you buy see if bulk pricing is available (means you’re not buying from Lowes or home depot they don’t have ‘smart switch contractor packs) an outfit like TheSmartestHouse (zooz’ is thier house brand) you can usually get bulk prices for large purchases like an entire home worth of switching. So it needs to be a consideration in your choice.

5

Great feedback, I really appreciate all your comments and suggestions. I’m new to HA, but based on my research it seems the best platform to fulfill my home automation requirements (security cameras, sensors, light switches, automations, local control, etc.) I’m happy to see that it have a great community too.

The location is rural Costa Rica, and so, it uses the US standards with 120v. In fact, I plan to buy the wall switches in the US. In Costa Rica, you can get fiber and great Internet in the cities and in some rural communities with good tourism, but other rural areas are not that lucky.

It is good to know that I could pair the MOES “directly with zigbee coordinator using zigbee2mqtt like the sonoff usb stick.” That may be a good option, because I don’t want to deal with a Tuya cloud account.

I just looked at the springs smart switches, but unfortunately they seems to be for the European market. But, they look very nice. I need to go back and look again at Lutron Caserta and Zooz. I certainly want to avoid WiFi devices, maybe one or two exceptions that I could segregate into a vLAN. That could be my last resort if there is no other option, because without Internet there is little point on having a WiFi router.

The idea of using “zigbee wall outlets to build the powered mesh” is a great one, and I will certainly add few zigbee wall outlets.

I should mention that the security system will be using wired devices for the door and window sensors. I have had enough issues in my current house with battery powered devices in the security system. For some reason the motion detection sensors start beeping a midnight every eight to nine months, and that requires a call to the security company, and it is a pain. I want everything local and wired.

Thanks for the advise on “smart electric panels”. I was not aware that such a thing existed, so I now need to research them to understand what they do. I also appreciate the suggestion to buy in bulk, because this is a new build, an that makes a lot of sense.

I really appreciate all the great suggestions. They help me understand which brands should I focus on and what to take into account. Any other suggestions are welcomed.

1 Like
6

If you use a DSC (powerseries) or Honeywell panel you can use a device called an EVL4 to bring in the wired security system in lock stock and barrel. (including all the sensors…)

Springs referred to Springs Window Fashions (also sold as Graeber, Bali and a few others) they make ZWave window shades and blinds.