I just upgraded one of my H801 LED controllers to esphome (from an old custom firmware), but I’m having issues integrating it with Home Assistant. Specifically, I’m able to add it, but HA reports no devices/entities and hence it cannot be controlled.
Automatic discovery in HA failed, but adding via IP worked (and it subsequently retrieved it’s defined name from the api)
HA reports No devices or entities for the entry.
esphome logs shows that it
is able to connect via network
confirms that it sees the connection from HomeAsisstant.
Lists expected settings, including wifi, the 5 PWM channels, and the 5 Light devices I defined [one per channel].
No errors in logs
I’ve tried a few iterations so far without change, including adding an api password, reverting to the example single-light definition, restarting everything, deleting+readding in HA.
There is an entry in the logs about safe mode, I think this is just echoing settings though and not indicating it’s in safe mode.
My esphome firmware was installed via CLI docker (Package esphome · GitHub) image pulled today. HA is separately running via docker and shows as up to date (2025.5.3)
See the link - my first attempt was copy/paste from that with just the wifi info and device name updated appropriately.
The only warning in the compile/run output is about “The minimum WiFi authentication mode is not set”.
I do see in the runtime logs from esphome that HA keeps reconnecting today (last night I only saw the disconnect when I reconfigured HA), but I don’t think that’s the main issue.
[20:09:33.959][W][api.connection:2226]: Home Assistant 2025.5.3 (192.168.3.5): Reading failed CONNECTION_CLOSED errno=11
[20:09:36.290][D][api:139]: Accept 192.168.3.5
[20:09:38.331][D][api.connection:2221]: Home Assistant 2025.5.3 (192.168.3.5): connected
[20:10:08.508][W][api.connection:2226]: Home Assistant 2025.5.3 (192.168.3.5): Reading failed CONNECTION_CLOSED errno=11
[20:10:11.622][D][api:139]: Accept 192.168.3.5
[20:10:13.647][D][api.connection:2221]: Home Assistant 2025.5.3 (192.168.3.5): connected
I just enabled debug logging in HA and see timeouts on that end:
HomeAssistant | 2026-01-25 20:15:11.205 WARNING (MainThread) [aioesphomeapi.reconnect_logic] Can't connect to ESPHome API for h801d24 @ 192.168.3.152: Timeout waiting for HelloResponse, ConnectResponse after 30.0s (TimeoutAPIError)
HomeAssistant | 2026-01-25 20:15:11.206 INFO (MainThread) [aioesphomeapi.reconnect_logic] Trying to connect to h801d24 @ 192.168.3.152 in the background
HomeAssistant | 2026-01-25 20:15:11.206 DEBUG (MainThread) [aioesphomeapi.reconnect_logic] Retrying h801d24 @ 192.168.3.152 in 2.00 seconds
HomeAssistant | 2026-01-25 20:15:11.206 DEBUG (MainThread) [aioesphomeapi.reconnect_logic] Starting zeroconf listener for h801d24
HomeAssistant | 2026-01-25 20:15:11.206 DEBUG (MainThread) [aioesphomeapi.reconnect_logic] Scheduling new connect attempt in 2.00 seconds
HomeAssistant | 2026-01-25 20:15:11.206 WARNING (MainThread) [aioesphomeapi.connection] h801d24 @ 192.168.3.152: Connection error occurred: h801d24 @ 192.168.3.152: Connection lost
Interesting … I had assumed HA was up to date when I checked in Settings and it showed no updates available and there was no popups like I remember seeing in the past.
In any case, I just explicitly pulled the latest and restarted HA and now the devices are showing up.
I’m still relatively new to HA, but I’m surprised there are so many breaking changes between releases.
I would venture you still have underlying network issues that have contributed to your now-solved problem, but won’t prevent it happening again.
HomeAssistant relies on weekly and monthly release cycles. If these are not being flagged, you risk missing out on bug fixes and improvements. Expect them.