I see, a couple of questions.
Is the dimmer turning the light off? And I guess the dimmer is for brightness only, for colour change only the remote, correct?
As I understand it, the gateway is still required. The bulbs that list the same configurations but different prices are the differences in changing the warm/cool colors and dimming versus just one color and dim adjustable.
If you get the gateway, you can configure the Tradfri bulbs any way you want in Home Assistant as well as through the app, where without the gateway, you can’t control them via Home Assistant nor through the app, only the remote puck can change them.
Even with the integration with Google Home, Apple Homekit, and Alexa, the gateway is still going to be required to communicate between them.
did you end up controlling it via the wink hub or did you just use the ikea hub? i have both, just debating on which direction to go. Not currently using the wink for anything, but it was $17 so i bought it
It also puzzled me till I turned then on. The one with 1000 lumen is white only, and they other with 980 lumen tuneable to other colour temps.
@sallgood do you use the Wink hub to control IKEA lights or the IKEA Gateway ? If you use the Wink hub did you pair the remote with it and have it shown in HASS so it can be used by anything in HASS ?
I’m currently using the Tradfri hub (IKEA gateway). I never could figure out a way to get HASS to recognize the remotes (thru Tradfri hub or Wink).
Anyone having problems with the lights appearing and disappearing from HA?
I have everything properly configured, but, because I didn’t read any instructions, I didn’t buy a steering device. However, the modified version of the technique mentioned above seems to work fine: I press the link button, turn the bulb on inches from the hub and a note appears on the app saying the bulb is paired.
Unfortunately, the bulbs didn’t immediately appear in HA. Then they all appeared as I was fiddling, just after I paired one of the bulbs. Then they disappeared. I thought the pairing was the key and paired some more, but that didn’t do the trick. At the same time I was having problems setting up my MQTT broker so was restarting HA a lot and once, they all appeared again. I was able to add them to groups and turn them on and off through the HA front page. Then they all disappeared as I continued fiddling with HA, never to be seen again, despite my restarting HA a lot.
At the moment the only error showing is that the timer was reset. I don’t know if it helps pin down the problem, but the app hasn’t moved on from the “start by choosing the device you want to add” page. Other than that, both the Tradfri hub and HA can clearly be seen on my network, although they are about as far apart as you can get and stay connected.
The only solution I can think if is to get a steering device (specifically a dimmer) in the hope that this will kick things into action, but I have a horrible feeling it won’t and it is a bit of a hike to the nearest Ikea to pick them up. I was also wondering if I needed to get devices for all the bulbs or if just one will move me forward in the app and that might, somehow, iron out any wrinkles with the HA integration. I may have to do this anyway, just to rule this angle out as part of my troubleshooting.
What concerns me is that the bulbs have rarely appeared in HA, which suggests there is something else causing problems.
To answer your questions partially: you only need one steering device to add devices. Once added, you can put lights in different groups using the app and you put the steering device in one of those groups as well so the buttons will only work for that group.
And what about ordering a dimmer to get send to your home? They’re not that expensive and will probably make things easier for you.
As for your problems of lights not showing up, I bought a dimmer and followed the instructions: never had any problems with the lights.
Hope this helps!
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Thanks for the advice, I suspect I was just looking for a bit of a push to go, so I whizzed down today - I had two unopened bulbs and I swapped them for two bulb with dimmer sets.
Linking the dimmers to the hub worked fine and I added three bulbs upstairs to one and three downstairs. The bulbs all linked but not everything is working right:
Upstairs - all three bulbs appear in the group and are controllable from the app, but the dimmer only controls one of them. Update: as I was typing this the gateway disappeared and reappeared and the one bulb that was controlled by the dimmer has become unreachable like the downstairs ones (Update 2: it appears a mischievous elf turned off two of my upstairs lights, why one was showing as unreachable and the other wasn’t is beyond me, but I turned them on and it was reachable, turned them off and they were both unreachable now, so at least this bit makes sense):
Downstairs - all the bulbs are controllable through the dimmer but none of them appear in the app, the group is there but it is empty. If I go to settings and “manage your devices,” I can see all the 6 bulbs, but the downstairs ones are greyed out. If I go to “Tradfri version” the downstairs lights are listed as “unreachable”. I Googled it, but no-one else seems to have reported the problem.
I’ve been keeping an eye on the app and the gateway seems to become uncontactable now and again. Perhaps related to this is that I set the default language and it doesn’t “stick.”
My guess is the problem with the gateway. I will have to give Ikea’s helpline a bell and then, if hat doesn’t work, a factory reset. If all else fails it is another trip to Ikea. Unless someone else has a good idea.
New firmware released that makes it work with Hue, Google Home and Alexa.
https://developers.meethue.com/comment/3696#comment-3696
Link in swedish, maybe use google translate for english: http://feber.se/pryl/art/368930/ikeas_smarta_lampor_stdjer_nu_/?utm_content=bufferee378&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer
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Big thanks for sharing. Was waiting for this 
Do you need a Ikea gateway to update the bulb firmware?
I have no idea, but I’m guessing so, unfortunately. I don’t yet have a gateway, and now it seems like a waste to buy one since I have Hue… It will also be interesting to see if you can get the remotes and such to work with the Hue bridge.
Yes it would be good to get the remotes working, but as far as I know they dont work/work well with the ikea gw yet
I guess we’ll need to wait a few months for bulbs with the new f/w to appear in the stores.
Seems like the gw update is not yet released after all. But ppl have got the bulbs in the Hue app.
Any of you have paired your Trådfri lights to the hue hub? I did it last week and everything worked fine, but now three of my lights are constantly unreachable. One of them is literally like ten cm away so it shouldn’t be a distance issue. Unpaired it and tried to pair again, now it can’t find it…
Hi there! Sorry to up this old thread.
I can’t see any more the color temperature slider, just brightness.
Am I missing something?
Does the pairing technique without a remote still work? I’m trying it right now but without success… (app stays in the ‘choose your remote’ screen)
I suspect it still works, but I had a nightmare with it - lights dropping off the app, not being to get anything to work consistently, etc. I took some bulbs back and got a couple of replacements with remotes and that didn’t seem to help much, even after factory resets.
Eventually, I took the hub back and replaced it with a new one (a little cheeky as it was my messing around that seems to have caused it to go a bit mad) and that has worked out nicely. My main problem is that the modules seem to be taking forever to load and causing all sorts of errors. I’m trying to sort them out, but will post back if I can’t fix it.
Long story short: Just get at least one bulb/remote set - you can use the remote to pair all your bulbs and then move them over to new groups. It may be possible to do without a remote, but it doesn’t seem worth all the time and hassle.
I wonder after reading the news that IKEA’s products will integrate with both the Mi Home app and the Xiao AI assistant:
Will it be possible to connect Xiaomi products with IKEA hub? Or is it already possible?
Sounds like it will be the other way around, Ikea devices will be discoverable by the Xiaomi platform.
Tip: just a couple of weeks ago I ordered a Raspbee, a small GPIO header for a Raspberry Pi, which turns your RasPi into a generic Zigbee hub to which you add a lot of Zigbee devices and control from HA. Conbee is an alternative in the form of a USB stick. I’ve added two Aqara (Xiaomi) door sensors, works very well!