Struggling - Smart Switches for Smart Lights

Hardware
1

Hi,

I’m struggling to find an answer. It seems like there are forum posts that are very similar to my question, but not really the exact question.

I am (slowly) migrating away from Google/Wyze to strictly Home Assistant.

I’m currently set up with the Casa Bonita thing (I forgot what it’s called) that allows Google to control my HA devices, and a mixture of Zigbee and Wyze lights, switches, and plugs.

Swapping out Wyze bulbs and plugs with Zigbeeli is very straightforward, however, what I’m struggling with is a 1:1 replacement for the Wyze switches.

Basically, I want users (ages preschool to centurion+) to be able to control all the lights with voice, app, or switches.

Wyze smart switches can work two(three) different ways:
(1) Press them to toggle a dumb light on/off by closing/opening circuit
(2) Press them to send an on/off command to Wyze to signal a light to stop or start emmitting lights (keeping the circuit closed)
(3) Other things that I don’t care as much about - single/double/tripple/long press for different actions

What I have found so far are Zigbee switches that are stand-alone battery powered buttons, battery powered mechanical devices that are attached to an existing switch to make it “smart”, or switches that wire into the wall that open/close a circuit.

Are there Zigbee switches that can do what the Wyze switches do?

More details that probably don’t matter: For fun reasons, everyone here can use their voice or apps to change the colors of lights in rooms, or activate scenes/automations, but, when someone needs a normal, whitish light turned on, especially in an emergency or urgent situation, or they’re just in a hurry, and maybe aren’t used to technology, they’re going to want to just hit a light switch instead of trying to think about what exact phrase they have to tell the voice command, or pull their phone out of their pocket, unlock it, open an app, find the device, click it, get the thing out of the room, and then either think of the exact phrase to tell voice command, or get their phone, unlock it, find the device, click on it, oops they clicked the wrong thing and turned something off on the other side of the house, girlfriend is now in the dark and pissed, turn the light off, then turn the other light back on, she already turned it on so now I turned it off again, turn it on again, she’s yelling now, run upstairs and stub my toe because I’m in the dark, “hey google turn all lights to 100%”, teenage son is woke up by the light and has finals tomorrow so needs sleep, I walk into the hallway apologizing to girlfriend, son comes out of his room to see what’s happening and is confused, three more kids wake up and come out of their rooms panicked because they were woke up by their lights turning on and people in the hallway talking loudly, I’m so tired I just need to sleep DO YOU SEE WHY I WANT PHYSICAL SWITCHES TOO?

Any help is appreciated! :slight_smile:

Plan B could be to use automations to turn on a Zigbee switch, which would then also turn on the Zigbee light if configured to emit light when powered on, but I’d rather the lights stay powered 24/7 so that they can act as Zigbee routers on my Zigbee mesh network.

Thanks!!!

2

Why change the switches you have? Just set them up to do the same in HA.

At worst it will involve removing the wires from the switch contacts and joining them together.

1 Like
3

I agree with @Arh . You can get Wyze to work with HA by using this custom integration.

Now, if you’re wanting to move away from cloud based devices, ZigBee/Z-Wave is definitely the way to go. There are plenty of those protocol switches that work flawlessly with HA. You will need to wire them up but it looks like Wyze switches need the same.

If you’re wanting to solely have the switches send commands, you’ll need to hot wire the bulbs to live so they constantly stay powered on and only receive commands from automations you set up. I currently have this with my Tuya Smart Fans and Z-Wave in-wall switches. That way people can use the switches as usual and Z-Wave registers the on/off state and automates the fan’s light/blades. The only pitfall with this is if the bulbs become unresponsive, you’ll need to manually power cycle them by unscrewing them and screwing them back in.

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4

Wyze switches can control Zigbee devices via Home Assistant?

Is that what you’re saying?

Because that would make this whole endeavor a lot easier!

5

I did not know this! This makes it a lot easier!!! I was only looking for integrations included with HA; maybe that’s why I missed it.

Thank you @Arh and @techwithjake !!

6

Welcome to HA! You’re only bound by the limitations of APIs. Just cause it’s not in HA officially doesn’t mean it can’t be controlled. There’s a vast world of custom integrations that just aren’t prime time for HA and thus aren’t included.

HACS can make your new endeavors so much easier.

7

You don’t say what country, but for the US look at Inovelli Blue Series 2-1 Smart Switch | Smart Light Switch & Dimmer Switch.

Run in “smart bulb mode” and bind to your zigbee lights.

No cloud dependency and no HA dependency for basic on/off functionality, but HA can still control everything.

1 Like