Hi, I’m completely new to HA, but just installed it on a Raspberry Pi 4 Model B, following the official HA installation guide. Everything works but can’t seem to switch over to run it over Wifi.
I connected HA to my wifi router (In Settings → System → Network → WLAN0 → Wifi it says 'Connected to '). But as soon as I unplug the Ethernet cable and restart, I can’t get in contact with HA.
Through my router I can see it has an IP-address, so I know it is has Wifi access still after reboot. I’ve tried to connect (through the browser) both homeassistant.local:8123 as well as the IP-address - nothing works.
If I replug the ethernet cable, it will work again. Even though it is connected to wifi at the same time, in Settings → System → Network → ‘Network Adapter’ I can see only one adapter - i.e. the ethernet adapter. That doesn’t seem right.
What am I missing/doing wrong? I hope someone can help, as I’ve googled for an hour now and can’t find a solution.
Welcome to HA. Sorry about the previous post, sometimes we can be somewhat terse around here.
You most certainly can run HA over WiFi, I do, and have for years. No, it’s not “as good” as wired, and my preference would always have been a wired connection, based on past experience in the field. But I’m trying to get over that. Wireless networks are much better these days, and can be almost as reliable as wired.
That said, I don’t have any current instructions for setting it up. I asked this question back in early 2019 and was able to get enough hints to figure it out, but things may have changed since then. I did notice this link later that year and made a note of it then, maybe it’ll help. Even better would be to use a search engine with site:home-assistant.io and search this forum and the HA documentation.
Don’t give up, it can be done, and many of us are doing it.
hi CaptTom. Thanks for your constructive reply. I did eventually manage on my own, by following these instructions (Guide: Connecting Pi with Home Assistant OS to wifi (or other networking changes)), but with the critical extra step that was, setting wifi ip address to ‘auto’ , as it otherwise wouldn’t actually fetch an IP address from my DHCP server. I can see the links you sent me also does the same. Thanks!
For anyone stumbling onto this thread in the future, my recommendation would be to reserve an IP address for HA in your router, and use DHCP for HA. Wired or wireless, having a stable IP address makes life a lot easier going forward. At some point you’ll want to access HA remotely, and depending on the method you chose, having a consistent IP address may be necessary.
The other other option, as you found, was to define a static IP address in HA, and not use DHCP. This is a more advanced option, since your LAN address space will need to be set up to avoid duplicate addresses, and you’ll need to know your subnet and default gateway.
Don’t. It is a bad idea to run HA (or any server) over wifi.
You know what is a bad idea? Saying something is a bad idea without any proof. Maybe you imagine wifi to be a weak radio signal from the 30th but it is not. Are you also still using wired headphones and wired mouse? And your printer is connected by a IEEE 1284 cable?
From my 5+ years experience: Wifi works great! Only downside is that HA has a bad user experience setting it up because it requires to have it connected by ethernet cable in the first place or connect the Pi by HDMI cable. Every other device like a smart speaker or a vacuum robot creates a wifi network where you connect and then add the wifi data.
I may be missing some information, however would a Wi-Fi smart device like a Tuya WiFi (Zigbee is also available, but then I’d need to buy a ZigBee USB adapter for the Home Assistant server) Temperature&Humidity Sensor work with a Wi-Fi access point? The Wi-Fi access point is connected via Cat6 to the Home Assistant server (Home Assistant also has network (to Internet and the local network) connection via Cat6).
Yes most consumer access points create the wifi network as on the same subnet as the wired connections. Some do have the ability to disallow wifi devices to connect to each other, or the wired network, but you can turn that off. Look for “client isolation” or similar wording in your AP.
Simple test, can a wifi device (eg your phone) connect to HA?
Thanks.
Just realised the difference is Wi-Fi uses more power and Zigbee uses less power.
However Zigbee needs a battery replacement every 2 years and a Zigbee USB adapter as well, whereas I already has a WiFi Access Point.
