I want to buy a Nuki Smart Lock Ultra and i am confused about the configuration.
I have HA running on a pi5. I have installed the ZBT-1 zigbee dongle and I have configured it for ZHA.
What I have read about the configuration for the Smart Lock Ultra is that I need to connect it via Thread or MQTT. The problem that I am facing is that I can’t use my ZBT-1 because of the configuration for ZHA.
The Smart Lock Ultra doesn’t need a bridge because of its wifi capabilities. I could connect it to my Google home because it serves as a thread border router. The Google Home is my preferred network in the Thread integration. I haven’t installed any thread devices yet so I don’t have any experience with that.
If I connect the Smart Lock Ultra to the Google Home will everything be exposed to Home Assistant? I mean will I see all states and will I be able to lock and unlock?
If not, can I install a second ZBT-1 dongle and configure it for MQTT and Thread?
Is there an other way like using the Nuki cloud? This is my least preferred method because I would like to run this only locally.
Using WiFi over MQTT. As you said (and the official FAQ states), you can use it without a bridge. I think this is fine for some testing/playing around, but I would not use WiFi on a daily basis, due to the higher battery consumption.
Using Matter over Thread with your existing Google Home as a Thread Border Router (TBR).
I am a bit confused by your sentence “If I connect the Smart Lock Ultra to the Google Home will everything be exposed to Home Assistant? I mean will I see all states and will I be able to lock and unlock?” -
Is your Google Home already known to HA or do you want to keep it separate?
If it is already known, this should be very straightforward. According to the documentation (“You do not need to install this integration. The Thread integration shows up automatically when Home Assistant detects a border router.”see here), you should already have a Thread integration. Then just add the Matter integration and add the Nuki as a new Matter device. Given your background, this is the solution I would recommend at first.
If it is not known (and should not be), this solution can be dropped by my understanding.
Using Matter-over-Thread and your RPi as a TBR. This could either be done with the Multiprotocoll and one ZBT-1 (not recommended, but for some users it seems to work fine, so you might as well just try it). OR, you could add a second ZBT-1 and run one with ZHA and one with Thread. If you do not want to expose your Google Home to HA, I would choose this solution.
But no matter how you decide, I’d love to be kept updated. Especially if you choose the Matter integration (solution 2 or 3), I would love to see what entities the lock provides.
It is good to know that I can use possibility 1 in case I don’t succeed with Matter.
Regarding option 2.
My Google home is already know in HA and I see the Google home as a thread border router in HA.
I have never done anything with Matter so I have no experience with it. I should add the lock to the Google home?
At the moment the lock is not available anymore. But I will update this Post with my experiences when I have it installed.
This is my understanding (take with a grain of salt, I’m not a total expert either ):
When you have the Google Home Device (as a TBR) in HA, you should automatically have the Thread integration (as mentioned above, see here).
Then, you need the Matter (server) integration (and the Matter AddOn, which is automatically added once the integration is set up, see here).
At last, you should be able to add (“comission”) the lock using the iOS/Android companion app (see here).
I do not have access to my instance right now, it could be that this not found under add device but under Settings → Devices etc. → Add integration → Add Matter device (should at the top of the list)
The individual steps are also explained quite well in the documentation. Let me know when you are facing any issues
I’m also thinking of getting it, but I think one important connection methodology was overlooked, which is bluetooth.
From what I gather from the various projects that emulate bridges etc, the Ultra is listed as supported. My guess is that while the bridge hub is not needed, it’s certainly still possible. I haven’t looked at the Nuki docs too deeply yet, but all seems that this flow is still supported. If so, I think the preferred local way, that does not drain batteries would be HASS with bluetooth(-proxies) etc. See GitHub - ronengr/hass_nuki_bt: Control Nuki Lock over bluetooth for example.
I’m curious what others find though; as for now it seems to be unobtainable
just got mine today.
Completely missed the ‘thread border router’ for matter requirement. I somehow assumed the matter over wifi would work. But it doesnt
The pairing over bluetooth doesnt succeed either, it ends up at ‘error’ with no logs thus far.
So for the sake of at least seeing a lock entiry, i enabled the mqtt in the lock and that makes populate the entities I wanted.
Will play a bit more on BT integration from HACS to see why it fails
Mqtt does the job fine. Bt Just doesnt pair. So for now the wifi is on, Will see how battery will last. Current;y 3 precent down in a week, not too bad I suppose
I am also thinking of getting one of these locks, either the Ultra or the new Pro which was released today apparently.
@checking12 can you confirm that I only need wifi to remotely access the lock via MQTT? That would be really nice, since I am not interested in moving to matter yet.
Being able to open the lock via Homeassistant would also allow me to retrofit a NFC reader since Nuki does not seem to offer anything for any of their locks (unlike Aqara). This way I can hand out NFC tags to people who need access
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