Levoit LV600S Local Control with ESPHome

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I wanted fully local control of my Levoit LV600S humidifier without depending on the VeSync cloud, so I went down the rabbit hole to get ESPHome on the device.

Levoit LV600S
Levoit LV600S2048×2048 100 KB

The LV600S has an ESP32-SOLO-1 module inside that talks to the appliance’s main controller over UART. So I dumped the original ESP32 firmware, and after that I poked through it to figure out how the stock firmware talked to the humidifier MCU.
Based on that:

  • ESP32-SOLO-1 / ESP32-S0WD
  • UART on GPIO17 TX and GPIO16 RX
  • 9600 baud
  • Commands for power, mist level, warm mist, target humidity, display, timer, and status polling

Once that was understood, I made an ESPHome external component that speaks the same protocol directly to the humidifier controller.

Right now I have these working in Home Assistant:

  • Power
  • Mode select
  • Display on/off
  • Target humidity
  • Mist level 1-9
  • Warm mist level 0-3
  • Timer
  • Current humidity
  • Current temperature
  • Water/tank status

A couple of important notes if anyone else tries this:

  • Dump your stock firmware first.
  • This replaces the cloud firmware, so assume the app/cloud features are gone afterward.
  • The ESP32-SOLO is single-core, so ESPHome needs the unicore build option.

I put together a repo with the YAML and custom ESPHome component here:

https://github.com/wdm230/levoit-lv600s-esphome.git

How I flashed ESPHome

  • Unplug the humidifier from the wall before opening it.
  • Remove the screws between the water tank area and the display section.
  • Remove the screws holding the display PCB so you can access the ESP32 module area.
  • Connect/solder RX, TX, and GND from the ESP32 board to a USB UART adapter (Pin out below).
  • Do not try to power the board from the USB UART adapter. Mine would brown out that way.
  • Solder/connect IO0 to GND so the ESP32 boots into flashing mode.
  • Plug in the USB UART adapter first.
  • Then plug the humidifier into the wall so the board is powered normally.
  • Use ESPHome/esptool to connect to the ESP32.
  • Dump the stock firmware and keep it somewhere safe.
  • Flash the ESPHome firmware.
  • Boot it normally, test that Home Assistant can control the humidifier, then put everything back together.

ESP32 Solo-1 Pinout
ESP32 Solo-1 Pinout400×537 37.6 KB