Philips Hue bulbs paired directly work as Zigbee repeaters

Configuration Zigbee
1

Just wanted to share that Hue bulbs if pared directly to Home Assistant seem to work as excellent Zigbee repeaters.

I have a mix of Sengled and Hue bulbs - My Hue bulbs had always been paired directly to a Hue Hub. In this configuration the Hue bulbs will be operating in ZLL mode and only form a Zigbee mesh network for other devices on the same Philips hub – they won’t work as general repeaters.

However, if you factory reset the Hue bulb and join it directly to Home Assistant the bulb will start operating in ZHA mode and serve as a general Zigbee ZHA repeater.

I’m using the HUSBZB-1 combo Zigbee / Zwave adapter. I used the excellent hue-thief to factory reset the bulbs. The bulbs can also be reset via the Hue hub or directly via a paired remote or dimmer.

2 Likes
2

I realize this is really old but, I was curious if you thought you had to reset the bulbs, even if they’ve never been paired to a hub before. It makes sense if they’ve been paired to a hub.

I recently got a hue bulb and paired it straight to a HUSBZB-1 using zha.permit, so, there’s a piece of me saying I ended up with the same result.

forgive me if there’s a bucket of ignorance in my statements, as I’m just getting into all of this.

1 Like
3

Yes, virtually all, if not all, mains powered zigbee devices act as routers too.

The OP just had more to do as he had already paired them with a Hue hub.

2 Likes
4

awesome! thanks!

5

If you pair the Philips Hue bulb directly to HA do you still get the Philips Hue scenes for the bulb? Or do you have to create those yourself?

1 Like
6

You would have to configure the scenes through HA.