Philips Hue will force users to upload their data to Hue cloud

I think your hub is still talking to the cloud. To make it local-only you need to block internet access from its IP address, which you do on your router.

Just messaged their twitter account with my dismay over the decision.

Also removed all lighting from my Hue hub and removed the integration. TBH, the only thing I’ll miss at all is the Hue scenes, which are marginally easier to use than HA scenes. Not worth the risk of being forced into a cloud account to use the bulbs.

Overall, I am almost grateful to Hue, though, as this was something I’d been meaning to do for a while, for the sake of consistency, since I have a mix of Hue, Ikea, and other lighting, and now they’ll all be automated the same way. One less connected device to worry about as well.

For folks considering the move, I used both the Hue dimmer technique (Hold On + Off for 12-15 seconds immediately after turning the bulb off and back on, then after the bulb flashes, turn it off and on again to enter pairing mode) and simply removing the bulb from the Hue app. The latter technique is much faster, as the bulb immediately enters pairing mode, and ZHA was able to pick it up almost instantly. I have about a dozen Hue bulbs, two dimmers, and a switchable plug, and was able to get it all migrated (including repairing dashboard references, and adding automations that had been running in Hue) in a couple hours.

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How do you control the lights now?

Combination of:

  • Hue Dimmers
  • Ikea Shortcut or 5-way buttons
  • Dashboard buttons
  • Automations

Most of the lights in the main living area are turned on at sunset / off at bedtime by automations. Two sets of these lights are tied via automation/blueprint to Hue dimmers, which can turn on/off the group of lights, and make them brighter/dimmer. I’ve also got the long press on the dim up/down tied to individual scenes.

A less-used set of lights is set up with an Ikea 5-way button, with the center button being toggle on/off, and left and right controlling two scenes.

My family mostly uses a tablet dashboard I set up centrally. Each button controls a group of lights for a given room, and the UI makes it easy to either toggle the lights, or set the brightness/color, etc.

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Did you know there is a native app for android and iOS, and you can make beautiful dashboards very easily using tile cards? Without any YAML.

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I currently use diyHue with z2m and find that it works well.

I’m able to control genuine hue bulbs alongside 3rd party zigbee and wifi bulbs.

All of them function just like genuine hue bulbs; dynamic scenes, hue sync and even the current version of Hue’s app all function correctly.

Once you have diyHue up and running, the hue integration works well to control it all from within HA.

@Mariusthvdb’s scene selector is a particularly nice frontend for hue scenes.

emulatedhue has better integration with ha; I really like their feature that auto populates HA areas as rooms in the virtual bridge. Unfortunately, it only supports hue api v1 - so is basically worthless at this point.

Perhaps Signify’s decision will spark more interest in further development of both!

I’m interested in diyhue
so basically is something that emulates the hue bridge so it can be used by the app? in that case the app will still need login even with the emulated bridge right?

For now, yes.

I’d expect the ability to use the official hue app will go away once they require accounts.

Though the developer of diyHue and the hue essentials app collaborate with each other, so there will still be an option for app control.

I wasn’t specific enough. I’m not really wanting to spend additional money to buy a zigbee stick and then load zha or one of the alternatives.

I’m wondering if home assistant can use the api of the (now blocked from internet access) hue hub to change channels.

For whatever reason I have issues about once a year where bulbs start dropping out and a channel change seems to be the only thing that makes them come back. This is probably somewhat coincidental, but it works.

HA can’t change channels, but you could use the Hue Essentials app, which supports changing the channel and doesn’t require an account

Another big question now is if Home Assistant developers could make it even easier for users to migrate away from the Philips Hue integration and Philips Hue Bridge to Home Assistant’s built-in ZHA (Zigbee Home Automation) integration and the Home Assistant SkyConnect USB dongle, retaining most of the features and functions by replicating them and their user experience while fully removing the need to keep using a Philips Hue Bridge?

That is, how could the experience of using Philips Hue products with the native ZHA integration in Home Assistant be made as easy and good of an experience as using the original Philips Hue Bridge and app? And can replicating all features and functions available with Philips Hue Bridge and app be made easier? And can migration from Philips Hue Bridge to the ZHA integration be made more streamlined?

For example, I wish someone would develop easier ways for new users just getting started to add/use:

  • A set of default scenes if using ZHA to replicate the lighting scenes that come as standard with Philips Hue Bridge and app today.
  • An easier way to create new custom scenes similar to how it is done with the scene editor on the official Philips Hue app.
  • An easier way to add ”Formulas” features like example ”Living Scenes” from Philips Hue labs.
  • Philips Hue Zigbee OTAU (Over-The-Air Updates) firmware images included by default in ZHA OTA providers.
  • ZHA integration support for ZGP (Zigbee Green Power) devices via zigpy in order to allow using “Friend of Hue” switches based on Enocean’s PTM215ZE/PTM215Z/PTM216Z modules.
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I found this Philips contact page after a lot of searching: https://www.lighting.philips.de/content/B2B_LI/de_DE/kontakt-und-support/verbinden/kontakt.html it’s in German

for now I disabled internet connection for the HUE bridge. My setup is ok for months now so I don’t need to use the HUE application. Even The HUE Sync Box is working inside HA. So don’t use that app also.
Leave all the iOS updates as it is and wait what Philips will do when account is required. I have an account already (happy new user and followed the steps) but we don’t know yet if the API will removed from the bridge etc… So to be sure that nothing on my side will brick I disconnect the internet for the Bridge.

+1, especially the scene editor in HA is currently a real mess to use, it immediately applies the state of the devices and saves changed states while just viewing a scene.

Imagine having e.g a scene which powers off a smart plug connected to your PC, you want to add things to that and suddenly power to the PC where you edit it is killed.
The thing I like the most in the Hue App is that you can save the current state of lights as a scene, but also edit it without changing the physical light’s status.

the diyhue project seems a good start it has a way to replicate the hue API so the integration can be used normally and then some third party app can be used as a scene editor.

I have also disabled internet access for the HUE bridge and will wait to see how this is resolved further.

Can I get ZHA lights into diyHUE? If yes, how?

Hopefully one of the many Home Assistant supporters on Youtube will post a how-to for avoiding the requirement for having a cloud account… :wink: Then we can all rest easy…

We should be thankful Philips have been up-front about their intentions (now) to acquire our data and we can take appropriate action to guard against the company we all bought into…

I left a one star review of their app on Google play. Even told them to stow their canned responses.

This is really bad news. I wouldn’t hesitate to throw the HUE bridge in my wood chipper. BUT, sure as amen in church, the problem with the WAF would arise quickly. And rest assured that this problem is not cloud based, it’s 100% local.

Acceptance is currently high due to the user friendly native HUE app. Several bulbs are connected through native zigbee bridge though, but the “most important” goes through the HUE bridge.

Also, the HUE system has been super reliable, can’t think of many problems… It just works. Sadly my HA does not all the time. And it’s not nearly as user friendly.

The wake up lights is a real must, if that function would go from the house, I would be in big trouble.

The only thing I could hope for, is that some of the brilliant people around here will come up with a solution.

Damnit Signify, ofc security is important. But so is also integrity and privacy! And regarding security, is this a upgrade or a downgrade?

At least let me make the choice myself!

Ffs, I bought their really pricy products, since they were fine to use without internet access and without cloud. Now they’re pushing this change, and their products is rendered useless without internet (at least it will be required now and then) and cloud.

Is this even legal in the EU one must ask…?