I am sure that enough people here will swear that their setup works fine and they never had any issues with zigbee devices and zigbee2mqtt and it was the same for me for around a year. Over the past year my zigbee network grew steadily to around 50 devices now and I swear to you, I regret choosing this path!
Some time ago my zigbee switches started to become unresponsive, taking a few seconds to work but it steadily got worse. I am now at a point where most switches will only work sometimes and I need to open the app on my phone to play around with a device for a minute straight just to turn on/off my lights.
Just now I was sitting in the bedroom reading a book when my lights turned off. Using the zigbee lightswitch would not work, voice commands would not work, so I had to stumble around in the dark to find my phone to take a minute to turn the lights back on…
I am not new to stuff like this, I had this issue on a Raspi with a conbee II, changed the stick to sonoff usb 3, updated the firmware, did a fresh install on a VM, asked for help at the official github where other people report the same issues and no help is in sight.
I believe you, when you say that your setup works flawless but at any moment it could take a turn for the worse and you are stuck with thouasands of dollars of useless junk.
This stuff is beta grade without the support you can expect when getting corporate stuff. So just dont build your home on stuff like this if you still have the choice!
What is the difference from the way that your phone connects to the bulb compared to your voice assistant? Why is it working when you send the command from your phone but is not working when you use other devices?
The only way to get things working when a device acts up is to turn the device on, wait 10 seconds, turn it off, wait 10 seconds, turn it on again and hope that it worked. This works most of the time but sometimes needs to be repeated.
Issuing this sequence via voice commands would be rather tedious.
Oh and i forgot. I offered 50 € for a solution on github, this applies here too but mainly I want to raise awareness that this stuff is still beta grade software and that it is a gamble to invest lots of money in it like I did.
I am using around 50 devices in total, sensors, switches, outlets and led-controllers:
The sensors kinda report ok all the time though it is hard to say if maybe only half of the updates are received.
I have around 10 mains powered switches that control lights and ceiling fans. Two of them work reliable 100% of the time while the others only work sporadicly. (all the same no-name)
6 mains powered 3.0 LED controllers act up most of the time (GLEDOPTO)
15 outlets work most of the time but not all the time (different brands, no noticable difference)
5 simple ikea 2 button switches dont work most of the time
Distance to coordinator makes no difference, turning off my wifi makes no difference, using different usb extensions or ports makes no difference, latest zigbee update was a slight improvement
All it takes is a new neighbor to move in next door and fire up their wireless router, and your Zigbee network dies an ugly death. It’s likely Thread will suffer similar interference issues, since they both use the unlicensed 2.4 GHz band. This band is also used for Wi-Fi B/G/N, which most consumer grade smart devices also use.
Sry, I guess my english skills let me down here. I was talking about a battery powered 2-button remote that also is part of my zigbee network. I have no space for physical switches in addition to the zigbee switches.
Yeah that would be plausible but I live in a rather remote house and I know the frequency usage around here because I already checked using my router and my kali linux laptop.
I set it up as an automation because I do some more stuff with the button presses but you are right, I could try binding it and see if that works consistantly. Good idea!
80 Zigbee devices here (good bulb router coverage), Sonoff P dongle and solid as a rock. No regrets going the Zigbee route yet and no signs pointing to issues anytime soon.
I live in a big flat in a tall building in the city with a lot of neighbors above, below and around. I have two Zigbee networks here, one Hue and one with Sonoff with plenty of devices, also some Wifi, Z-wave and 433 devices is used. I have not seen any problems with the Zigbee devices yet.
Reading the thread, have you ensured you have a long, I use 2m, USB extension cable, between the RPi/computer and the sonoff usb stick? Make sure the sonoff stick is at least 1m from anything electrical.
Other questions. The zigbee channel? Your Wi-Fi channel? Any devices with Wi-Fi, like a printer? What sonoff firmware?
Does it always work if you control from the Z2M dashboard? Could it be a MQTT problem?
It should work?
I also have had great success with zigbee2mqtt. It certainly is a far more robust implementation that zwavejs2mqtt, and the variety and cost of the devices supported is amazing. Performance is almost instance, and aside from a hiccup with the 1.29.1 release, z2m has been easy to deal with and support.
I also run HA in an esxi VM, and run z2m on a raspberry pi located in a better location than my server rack in the house. It’s even POE powered from the switch in the server room that has UPS power. Works great.
My personal suggestion is Zigbee (others will probably chime to say different) The devices are cheap (although choose from good brands) and very reliable. Make sure you create a good mesh with them (set them up in their spot) and not too far apart.
Hello my friend, could it be an issue with interferences?
Are some of your Zigbee devices also signal repeaters (like power plugs)?
My personal experience with Zigbee is quite the opposite, I started my road into domotica in fact with Zigbee, several switch, move sensors, switch buttons and they are Rock solid. About 40 devices.
I wish I could have everything Zigbee but unfortunately most of the products are only available as wifi.
I am using the default ZHA integration and works great, even if I was tempted to give zigbee2mqtt a try I finally do not found any reason to do that.
Talking as a person with no experience with zigbee2mqtt, I would not suggest a new user to start with that but to begin with ZHA that works well and it’s easy.
Well… 36 zigbee devices and growing. I do not regret it. But basically I could say the same about z-wave. I have only issues with z-wave. Spent lots of money for partially non working devices by Fibaro. In comparison Aqara motion sensor works rock solid. The 45++€ Fibaro FGMS001 just suck…
The only thing which does not work well with ZHA are the new Aqara Thermostats… I hope puddly or another developer can fix this. Because the devices are really nice, but basically not really usable with ZHA at the moment.
Started with Zigbee with the HUE hub bout 5 years ago, then migrated to Smartthings when I moved into my new place. There were limitations on what I wanted to do but HA seemed a little too complicated and cumbersome even with me being from a tech background and years of development experience. In the end I did make my switch and I have decommissioned both the HUE hub and Smartthings and have everything on HA 2 years ago.
125 Zigbee devices thus far. A mix of powered and battery. Bulbs, switches, plugs, remotes, sensors. I have named brands from Aqara, Hue, Samsung, Sonoff and a bunch of tuya stuff. What I would say is stick to named brands, and some brands are better than others, Tuya stuff is a bit of a hit and miss to be fair, I would say I have a 70% hit rate. Hue bulbs and switches thus far rock solid, same for Ledvance and Innr bulbs. I have some Osram and Linkind bulbs and they just randomly drop off or turn on (I think cause they drop off and default is turn on when connected)
I live in a semi detached house with neighbours all around and wifi on the 2.4 is congested, I have my dongle on a powered USB2.0 extension lead on a USB2.0 HUB which also has a bluetooth dongle. All this is in my utility room which also has my wifi router. So far its stable.
ZHA definitely needs to improve for sure, for one, restarting HA restarts the Zigbee mesh, there needs to be a way to decouple it. Also firmware updates are lacking. Z2MQTT is better here but I just went with ZHA as it was the native integration for HA just for future support.
I think you might need more troubleshooting, could be a few reasons, one could even be a faulty router in your mesh which can be common. I had a bad Sonoff stick I was using a router and it kept dropping messages. After I re-flashed it, it fixed the drop outs.
Also the placement of the dongle in a central location in your house helps. My utility basically is under the house staircase which is in the center of the house.
I would say in general there is no silver bullet to this stuff. Serious DIY home automation is still only for enthusiasts and it’s not ready for the masses for the reasons the OP is stating. I also think it’s important to go with reliable brands and not white label stuff (this applies to a lot of cheap zigbee stuff).
I should also mention that I have had problems with zwave (Zooz switches specifcally). Different controllers can also have their own technical issues and I’ve tried Hubitat, Smartthings, and Home Assistant.
I think the safest route to go is to diversify your protocols so that there is a mix of zigbee, zwave and now Matter. Create a good mesh network for each of them. That way if one protocol is giving you problems it’s not going to bring down your entire house.
The devices are cheap (although choose from good brands) and very reliable. Make sure you create a good mesh with them (set them up in their spot) and not too far apart.