How to have color temperature mode for neopixelbus / SK6812 RGBW?

Let’s say there is a SK6812 lightstrip, so there are 4 channels: RGBW. With the White channel turned on, I expect by adding Red or Blue the white can be made either warmer or colder. Please let me know if this is not true or will turn out bad.

A basic config could look like this:

light:
  - platform: neopixelbus
    type: GRBW
    variant: SK6812
    pin: GPIO16
    num_leds: 30
    name: "ESP Test NeoPixel Light"

The light will show up in HA like:


There is no color temperature slider.

I would like to be able to set the color temperature in mireds. Probably a mapping has to be made for which amounts of R and B have to be added.

But then, how would this be finalised in the ESP config to have that color temperature slider in HA?

That is not available for that type of strip. It’s a fixed color (cool, warm, white) depending on what you buy.

https://www.amazon.com/BTF-LIGHTING-Individually-Addressable-Flexible-Waterproof/dp/B01MYV6VGD

Just a question , what did you flash the esp with ? Did you try WLED ?

I see you are using GitHub - Makuna/NeoPixelBus: An Arduino NeoPixel support library supporting a large variety of individually addressable LEDs. Please refer to the Wiki for more details. Please use the gitter channel to ask questions as the GitHub Issues feature is used for bug tracking.

If you know about WLED then ignore this

@Mikefila
Yes true. However by adding red or blue it could he created right. I just wonder how to get it done on the software side. Or are there similar/better strips with native color temperature?

@ALDIY
I have read a bit about WLED but don’t understand it yet. Please tell more if you have ideas.

There is a version of sk6812 with 3 different channels of white but no color. Even with those I don’t think you will get mireds unless there was an update.

WLED will give you more flexibility, it’s very similar to esphome. Just flash it to an esp board and specify the pins the strip is connected to.

Hello to you both ,

Sorry I missed this . In short wled is absolutely the best if you are using led strips or matrices and not a lot of sensors ( you can still use sensors with wled ) .

Wled is basically a complete firmware and an app solution for leds. You flash the firmware directly from a flasher and you can use the app to control your lights . You can change the pins you are using in the app without the need to re-flash .And of course you can easy integrate wled in HA and you will get around 200+ effects that is already built it and as Mikefila mentioned wled is very flexible and most importantly it is very easy to flash and use compared to what you are doing now with OTA updated , music reactive features , network sync and many more other features

I have tested using fastled and neopixle from ESPhome in HA vs using WLED and I must say it is like comparing assembly language to C++ !

I showed one of my setup using a matrix and WLED to a friend who is using fastled and asked him if he can do the same but two days later he just moved to WLED .

So I am still waiting for someone to explain why not use a specialized ready solution ? ( Unless you have the leds as a part of a bigger project or the aim is for DIY / education which i would also support ) .
I am asking and not criticizing because I have 4 MCUs running different version of wled and I wonder if I am not doing the correct thing and should do like you to control my leds because all of you cant be wrong

Wish you both all the best

Thanks again. I will try WLED and probably use WLED for sure. The main ‘issue’ of color temperature is not solved with that, unless it will have a feature for simulate that.

Hi @Saturnus. Did you ever come right with this? I’m wondering the exact same thing at the moment.

In the end I did not buy that special white light lightstrip (I was only testing at the time). I did buy regular RGB lightstrips for status LEDs and tried out WLED.
WLED by itself is good. The integration into HA I found somewhat disappointing if I remember correctly. I hope to have some LED projects soon.