Mi Flora battery life

Does anyone have any experience with the mi flora esphome sensor and how long the battery lasts?

I have one and it lasted 2 months before I had to replace the battery.

Just wondering if this is typical or if my device has an issue.

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The battery in mine lasted for over a year before I had to replace it.

Hmmm. Thanks.

Tested the battery itā€™s definitely flat after only 2 months. Will see how long the replacement lasts.

With a data request every hour, mine also last almost a year before I have to change.

Yeah but thatā€™s not the esphome sensor is it?

The esphome sensor does not request data it listens for broadcasts passively. There is no control over the update rate.

Iā€™ve had mine for about 2 and a half years now. I replace the battery about once a year. Itā€™s worth noting, the battery reporting is not terribly accurate. I changed the battery last month, and today itā€™s showing 64%. When I first put that battery in, it was showing 27% with the fresh battery. Iā€™d probably wait until itā€™s below 5% or stops working entirely before changing the battery, or just set a calendar reminder for once a year. That being said, itā€™s one of the most competitively priced sensors available, and the battery reporting is really the only complaint Iā€™ve had so far.

Are you using esphome to report the mi flora values?

Because it no longer reports battery levels in the passive broadcast.

Hi Tom,
i have found with the newer (green coloured body) sensors the battery life is significantly shorter (2 months or so) than the older white body ones i have

Edit: also using ESPHome, but as you stated, ESPHome is passive

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Ah! Thanks. I have the green version.

This simply isnā€™t going to be sufficient. Iā€™m not prepared to replace batteries every 2 months.

Iā€™ll either modify it to take a 1200mAh 3.7v lithium battery or bin it altogether. Havenā€™t made up my mind yet.

looking at the esphome logs, the sensors seems to broadcast constantly when comparing the timestamps for them

[23:54:33][D][xiaomi_ble:134]: Got Xiaomi HHCCJCY01 (80:EA:CA:88:B3:6C):
[23:54:33][D][xiaomi_ble:137]: Temperature: 27.4Ā°C
[23:54:33][D][sensor:092]: ā€˜Peace Lily Temperatureā€™: Sending state 27.40000 Ā°C with 1 decimals of accuracy
[23:54:37][D][xiaomi_ble:134]: Got Xiaomi HHCCJCY01 (80:EA:CA:88:B3:6C):
[23:54:37][D][xiaomi_ble:137]: Temperature: 27.4Ā°C
[23:54:37][D][sensor:092]: ā€˜Peace Lily Temperatureā€™: Sending state 27.40000 Ā°C with 1 decimals of accuracy
[23:54:45][D][xiaomi_ble:134]: Got Xiaomi HHCCJCY01 (80:EA:CA:88:B3:6C):
[23:54:45][D][xiaomi_ble:149]: Illuminance: 336lx
[23:54:45][D][sensor:092]: ā€˜Peace Lily Illuminanceā€™: Sending state 336.00000 lx with 0 decimals of accuracy
[23:54:50][D][xiaomi_ble:134]: Got Xiaomi HHCCJCY01 (C4:7C:8D:6B:01:97):
[23:54:50][D][xiaomi_ble:137]: Temperature: 27.0Ā°C
[23:54:50][D][sensor:092]: ā€˜Palour Palm Temperatureā€™: Sending state 27.00000 Ā°C with 1 decimals of accuracy
[23:54:53][D][xiaomi_ble:134]: Got Xiaomi HHCCJCY01 (80:EA:CA:88:B3:6C):
[23:54:53][D][xiaomi_ble:152]: Moisture: 25%
[23:54:53][D][sensor:092]: ā€˜Peace Lily Moistureā€™: Sending state 25.00000 % with 0 decimals of accuracy
[23:54:58][D][xiaomi_ble:134]: Got Xiaomi HHCCJCY01 (80:EA:CA:88:B3:6C):
[23:54:58][D][xiaomi_ble:152]: Moisture: 25%
[23:54:58][D][sensor:092]: ā€˜Peace Lily Moistureā€™: Sending state 25.00000 % with 0 decimals of accuracy
[23:54:59][D][xiaomi_ble:134]: Got Xiaomi HHCCJCY01 (80:EA:CA:88:B3:6C):
[23:54:59][D][xiaomi_ble:152]: Moisture: 25%
[23:54:59][D][sensor:092]: ā€˜Peace Lily Moistureā€™: Sending state 25.00000 % with 0 decimals of accuracy
[23:55:01][D][xiaomi_ble:134]: Got Xiaomi HHCCJCY01 (80:EA:CA:88:B3:6C):
[23:55:02][D][xiaomi_ble:146]: Conductivity: 328ĀµS/cm
[23:55:02][D][sensor:092]: ā€˜Peace Lily Soil Conductivityā€™: Sending state 328.00000 ĀµS/cm with 0 decimals of accuracy
[23:55:05][D][xiaomi_ble:134]: Got Xiaomi HHCCJCY01 (80:EA:CA:88:B3:6C):
[23:55:06][D][xiaomi_ble:146]: Conductivity: 328ĀµS/cm
[23:55:06][D][sensor:092]: ā€˜Peace Lily Soil Conductivityā€™: Sending state 328.00000 ĀµS/cm with 0 decimals of accuracy
[23:55:08][D][xiaomi_ble:134]: Got Xiaomi HHCCJCY01 (80:EA:CA:88:B3:6C):
[23:55:08][D][xiaomi_ble:146]: Conductivity: 328ĀµS/cm
[23:55:08][D][sensor:092]: ā€˜Peace Lily Soil Conductivityā€™: Sending state 328.00000 ĀµS/cm with 0 decimals of accuracy
[23:55:13][D][xiaomi_ble:134]: Got Xiaomi HHCCJCY01 (80:EA:CA:88:B3:6C):
[23:55:13][D][xiaomi_ble:137]: Temperature: 27.5Ā°C
[23:55:13][D][sensor:092]: ā€˜Peace Lily Temperatureā€™: Sending state 27.50000 Ā°C with 1 decimals of accuracy

I present to you the Franken-flora:

7dB increase in signal strength (from -90 to -83dBm in the centre of my lawn). Was supposed to be a 9dBi antenna but matching losses and Chinese advertising hyperbole took the other 2 dB.

1800mAh battery that should last about 16 months (I got 2 months from a 220mAh CR3220).

Waterproof enclosure for outside use.

Iā€™ll be surprised if it lasts a month.

Edit: holey shatballs bitman!

RSSI is now a steady -66dBm. I can move it further away from my irrigation controller and out of the centre of the lawn (which was a PITA to be honest).

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the mother of all MiFloras,
now is it whipper-snipper proof?

Itā€™s more whipper-snipper proof than the thin glass vial I had it in. Which isnā€™t saying much.

That box was surprisingly difficult to machine. Iā€™m guessing polycarbonate rather than ABS.

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My mifloras seem to last damn all time on batteries. Like a week!

Are these things supposed to be waterproof? Maybe the problem is moisture.

EDIT: having said that my outdoor sensor has just come back. It was all ā€œunavailableā€ yesterday. Using esphome.

I didnā€™t think they were, but looking on Aliexpress just now they are listed as IP5x

Having pulled one apart, I can say they are definitely not water resistant in any significant way.

Nick how are yours connected?

Through ESP home or using the home assistant integration?

ESP home listens for broadcast messages and there is no scan interval to set.

The Home Assistant integration actively scans the device and if you are doing this too often it will affect battery life.

mine are esphome connected. It might be that the initial batteries were nearly flat (there is some complaint of that on the aliexpress ad that @sparkydave just posted).

Combined with the crap replacement batteries I got from wish.com, it may just be unique to me. :slight_smile:

Combined with the hail storm we got here yesterday which almost buried the outdoor one and ruined my lettucesā€¦

Iā€™m also experiencing the same. Maybe not 2 months but not much more than that. Iā€™m also using ESPHome. I guess Iā€™ll try to factory reset it and see if it improves.

Did anyone solve this? Iā€™ve recently added an ESPhome to the mix, because one of my miflora sensors is too far from my HA NUC. Iā€™ve been really surprised to see how frequently the ESPhome picks up broadcasts from the miflora (once per minute or two) compared to the 20 minute updates Iā€™ve been used to with the HA native platform.

Itā€™s got to kill battery life, but I canā€™t see why it should be any different for ESPhome, particularly as it is supposed to be a passive approach.

I had been wondering whether the ESPhome esp32_ble_tracker, which triggers very frequent bluetooth scans (once per minute or two), is responsible for the flurry of activity from the miflora. Even though the xiaomi_hhccjcy01 sensor just waits passively for broadcast messages, maybe the general bluetooth scans prompts them to happen.

The Mi Flora sensor is supposed to be completely passive, just listening for broadcast messages:

From the sensor page:

Note

The ESPHome Xiaomi integration listens passively to packets the xiaomi device sends by itself. ESPHome therefore has no impact on the battery life of the device.

I think it is just that the newer model broadcasts more often: