Hmm. there is no such requirement.
Yes, there is a setting in configuration to permanently disable pairing ability. But you can keep it enabled. then you can decide about pairing using GUI button.
While I understand that for you mqtt is new component therefore you may consider it as added complexity, this model of decoupling processing adds to flexibility, transparency and durability of the system.
HA integrations in contrary are just blackboxes.
True.
Since everything is broken (again), I am giving zigbee2mqtt with mosquitto another try. Thanks to Docker easy going.
Everything seems to be connected correctly and I can see MQTT messages coming from z2m and connections from HA. However - having no device paired yet - not a single entry is present in HA, not even the coordinator. Is that an expected behaviour?
never looked to see coordinator as entity in HA.
devices added to z2m are being added to HA by discovery feature automatically (if discovery is enabled), or manually if you wish.
But great with mqtt is, that you can create HA entity manually from any data found in mqtt. Just by defining them as mqtt sensors, lights switches etc. It’s most flexible tool we have.
So if there is no option to show coordinator in HA as entity, you can always create one(s) on its own
Just quick update: So far zigbee2mqtt has been performing well as all devices I own (OSRAM/Ledvance, Innr and IKEA Trådfri bulbs) incl. a DIY router based on ptvo.info work. After pairing, they are discovered by HA using MQTT discovery.
Only thing that’s missing is mapping Zigbee-groups in zigbee2mqtt to HA groups. I create them groups in zigbee2mqtt first and map them to a (light) group in HA later. It is remarkable how lamps of the same zigbee group switch quasi-simultaneously, compared to the delayed and random reaction of the classic HA groups.
Would love to see this feature, but I think the precondition in HA’s disovery is yet missing.
Just moved my very small Zigbee network from Deconz + Phoscon to ZHA - I don’t know why I didn’t do that sooner.
What was the big difference you noticed? I’m looking for reasons to do it myself. But just not convinced about the stability compared do deconz.
I have been using deCONZ for like two years now and it is working fine.
ZHA
Correct me if I’m wrong, this is the native way of handling your Zigbee network?
deCONZ
As of now, still the most popular way of handling your Zigbee network?
zigbee2mqtt
This is another way, if you like MQTT and use it for other purposes as well? Otherwise it might just be unnecessary middleware to handle, if just using it for Zigbee?
Which one would be the preferred way to use in the future or does it completely depends on your taste?
It’s personal taste, but also experience. I tried ZHA first, deCONZ seconds and Zigbee2MQTT last. ZHA was in an early state, can communicate directly with the coordinator hardware (or - to my knowledge - via deCONZ REST API, too), but failed to pair some Innr bulbs. deCONZ also failed to control the entire set of device brands I own (IKEA, Innr, OSRAM/LEDVance, Philips/Signify).
Only Zigbee2MQTT did and does currently properly handle all my devices. Yes, it uses MQTT as a level of indirection, but that’s a benefit to me. MQTT is a stable, well known protocol and it allows controlling devices over a network (instead of via hardware on the host). A precondition for any cluster deployment of HA.
Thanks for your feedback. Right now I’m using ConBee 1 which is working fine in deCONZ. Just saw in the documentation for Zigbee2MQTT that it support ConBee 2 but only experimental. Will it have a official support in the future or how should I think here?
I’m working within IT so I’m not afraid of trying new stuff, but I also want a stable way of handling my Zigbee network. In that matter would you recommend migrating to Zigbee2MQTT and buy a ConBee 2 controller? I don’t think the officially supported controllers can be bought in my country, just the ConBee 2 controller.
Thanks in advance.
What country?
Sweden
I have only seen ConBee II to be sold here. Not even heard about the other controllers from the list below:
Oh, come on. In Sweden you can buy anything worldwide, amazon.se has multiple CC2530, CC2531 and other Texas Instruments devices in their shop and the Chinese do deliver, too. You need to flash them using an appropriate firmware first. Not hard to to, but not anybody likes.
The Conbee II is a good and powerful device. I have a Raspee II, which ist basically the add-on-module form of a Conbee II. Works okay, but the recent LQI index values are f*cked up in the recent firmwares.
With a Conbee II you can test use any of the three solutions first and decide later.
Yes, that I know. I meant officially, like at Kjell or similar. Sorry for misleading you. 
Right now I’m using Raspberry Pi 3 and using Razberry 2 for Z-Wave but I would like to migrate to Aeotec Z-stick because I’m thinking about moving my HA instance to my Linux server and run as a LXD container. Therefor I need the USB interface for all my controllers. This is why I thought “officially”.
I will try Zigbee2MQTT and Mosquitto with ConBee II. Have been working with other MQTT brokers in the past so Mosquitto would not be a challenge, I think 
It looks like Zigbee2MQTT supports all of my devices according to the list. I just got hang up on the experimental statement for ConBee II controller.
Thanks for all help this far
I only had Tasmota flashed devices at home, but as I’m reaching almost 50 devices it’s beginning to be hard to manage the ips, and hostnames, and the need to configure each device on its own WEBUI. So I bought some zigbee devices to try and understand how it works.
Right now I have a Sonoff Wifi Bridge flashed with Tasmota, some sonoff sensors, door and motion, some buttons aqara single and double, xiaomi single-button remote, and Phillips hue remote + lightbulb.
First I started trying to use Tasmota2MTT directly with HA, it works pretty well, but it’s really a pain to add evewry device manually to HA.
Then I tryed ZHA. It’s just works, but I miss the option to configure the devices by yaml file, so we need to do it manually inside HA’s ui. When you have a lot of devices, it’s easier to add first the config file, and then when pairing ther device, everything would be already the way we want (friendly name, icons, and so on), the only thing we can do beforehand is to define the device_class.
Also I coudn’t bind devices, it was just not working, remotes to groups, remotes to lights, nothing worked…
Then I tryed Zigbee2mqtt. This one I think it’s the best feature-wise, as you can configure the devices by config file, and do a lot more things than the others. You can create groups, bind remotes to groups by endpoint, change names and configuration of the devices (like occupancy timeout…).
What’s actually pushing me back to ZHA is that Z2M is sometimes too slow to respond if you do not use it for some time (like 1 or 2 hours). If I’m for some hours without using any zigbee device, when I do it, it doesn’t respond, and if I insist pressing other buttons on the remote is that after, let’s say, 30 seconds, all the commands I issued are done alltogether.
All the devices I have paired perfectly with the 3 of them.
I would really like to stick with z2m, as it allows me to interact directy with the tasmotas over mqtt without the need to go through HA, but this delay is preventing me as I have 3 systems that I manage (my house, my parents and my girlfriend’s parents), and while for us here we understand when the delay happens, it’s not that easy for the parents…
Does anyone had this issue and could fix it?!
I’m running everything on an MSI Cubi N 8GL with everything dockerized and all the containers are running well, so I think this is directly related to zigbee2mqtt…
I’m on deCONZ since beginning but I’m really thinking to change because of reliability. From time to time the addon enter a bad loop of crashing/restarting. Happened few times in the past months, and two days in the middle of night past week.
So, as of today, what is the best alternative?
As of today, what’s changed with respect to the beginning of this thread and its “solution”?
Advantages?
Comparisons of supported devices, capacity, range?
There is none. There are ZHA and Zigbee2MQTT.
In my specific situation (using “HA Container”), having a dedicated Zigbee2MQTT installation, connected to HA via MQTT integration has been working like a charm up to now.
I just moved from Deconz to Zigbee2MQTT and has to say that the immediate feeling is that it reacts much faster without loosing some packets on the way. I bought Sonoff dongle.
However, what I have not figured out yet and what might be a problem within HA itself is that there is now way to reliably control lights in groups. Whether you create “group.” in configuration.yaml or whether you create “light.” group as a helper, dimming or dimming when taking over from adaptive lighting is impossible. It freezes, then receives all the commands in a batch resulting in blinking forever… The solution for me was to control one reference light with the physical controller (IKEA switch) and having an automation that changes brightness of other lights when the reference light brightness changes. That works, but with small delay.
I recommend creating a (light) group in Z2M. They appear as single light entity in HA and all react immediately.
To my understanding, groups in HA are just a collection of entities and the entities are addressed sequentially. Instead Zigbee groups are more like a broadcast address and each group item listens to that address individually.
Sounds like a neat approach and logical explanation, however, it does not work. The behavior changed but it still wiggles. The dimming process is not smooth and when it hits maximum it starts jumping slightly back and again to the maximum, which causes blinking etc. Interestingly this problem behaces differently in Deconz and here in the light group in zigbee2mqtt or when I create the two above mentioned groups in HA.
The lights are different brands. Two are IMMAX bulbs above kitche stove, then one controller for five IKEA led panels.