Using tado° Smart Thermostat X through Matter

Configuration Matter/Thread
1

I’ve recently got a tado° Smart Thermostat X Starter Kit which uses Thread and is a Matter device too. This is somewhat of a mini review and should also serve as a place to discuss about this device in particular.

The tado° Smart Thermostat X can be added to Home Assistant through native Matter support. This allows to control the thermostat fully locally. Out-of-the-box the Thermostat comes with a Matter compatible QR code, so it can be paired with the Home Assistant Matter controller directly (essentially allows tado app free from the get go). However, this obviously gives only a very limited feature set; It allows to simply read and control the thermostat setting and read the humidity sensor.

image
image1063×933 97.4 KB

Also notable Matter software updates are not possible! The device does not support Matter native updates (no OTA requestor as of today).

So to get software updates and advanced feature connectivity with the tado app and cloud is required.

If you’ve paired it to a non-tado Matter Controller first (what I did :see_no_evil: ), it seems not to be possible to (Matter) share the device with the tado app/ecosystem. When trying to share with the tado app on my Android phone, the tado app would ask for “Serial No” and “Code”: At this point it only accepts the code from the packaging, which doesn’t work as the device is already paired. To me this seems a not-ideal implementation of multi-admin :sweat_smile:

In any case, factory reset helps to bring it back to original state, and allows to add the device to the tado app first. From there it can then be shared with the Home Assistant Matter controller (or any other). This seems to be the intended order of operation (and, in fairness, is also what the “Get started” leaflet asks you to do :sweat_smile: )

I’ve used a SkyConnect powered Thread border router, and the device at first would just not appear offline in the app. I’ve realized that the Thermostat requires cloud connectivity directly: Enabling NAT64 in the OpenThread Border Router add-on helped to get that going. Once enabled, the device appeared online in the app :tada: . The device then also updated it’s firmware from 181.2 to 219.1.

In general, the Matter side seems quite basic: It reports “heat” if the thermostat is enabled though their ecosystem, or “off” when off :man_shrugging: The automatic modes or schedules from the tado ecosystem are not exposed to Matter. Also Matter only schedules are not supported.

Hardware wise, the build quality is quite good. I like the mat finishing. Installation was well guided and quite straight forward. The display could have a bit better black value: there is quite some bleed when it is on (not sure but it doesn’t seem to be an OLED I guess?). The display is also only on when tapping it.

5 Likes
2

This is standard for a matter device.
The original QR code is only for pairing with the first matter network after a factory reset.
After the first pairing you will have to get a code from the thread border router in the network it is paired to in order to pair it to other matter networks.

3

I already was in contact with tado support regarding the missing automatic mode in Matter. They told me that’s not possible. :frowning_face:

In the Matter Application Cluster Specification there is a value 1 (Auto) in the SystemMode attribute of the Thermostate cluster. But it’s description states “Demand is generated for either Cooling or Heating, as required”.

I don’t know if the Matter specification even provides such use case atm. If I remember correctly I also was not able to trigger the auto/schedule mode of an Eve Thermostate with Matter firmware.

4

I know :smile: The QR code is essentially the password authentication credentials (for the password authentication session establishment, or PASE) for the first commissioning. From then onwards, an existing admin has to create new credentials (setup code/passcode) and ask the device to enter commissioning mode again.

That said, the thread border router has nothing to do with the authentication code here. This are orthogonal issues: Matter is the thing which wants authentication. Thread credentials is another topic.

However, and that is my point here, the tado app only accepts the original passcode :man_facepalming: They seem to derrive the passcode from the device serial number. Both need to be entered to commission using their app. But they really should accept any (setup) code.

5

On a quick look, I agree with their assessment. The Auto mode is meant for cooling/heating use case, not scheduling or other type of automatic set-point adjustment :frowning_face:

Ideally they would work with the CSA to extend the standard to support such use cases.

As a stop-gap, they could implement vendor specific Clusters. That is what Eve did to provider power/energy measurements while the standard didn’t had it yet. On Home Assistant side we can support such vendor specific Clusters, if necessary.

6

Small Question, is it possible to set the device into a force open or force closed state? or only temperature setting? reason i ask is that we use a woodstove that is connected to the heating system, and there must not be a closed system…

and final, is the 25degrees limitation gone in the new system??

7

How to you share the radiator thermostat X from the app? The support page says to go into the app, Settings, Rooms & Devices, select the device, scroll to the bottom and select “Device linking” - but I find no such option on the device page?!?

8

You have the NO (normally open) and NC (normally closed) terminals of the thermostat, and you can turn off the thermostat. So depending on your needs, just hook up the right terminal and then turn off the thermostat.

I can set it to 30°C here, so I guess? :thinking:

9

Under Settings → Rooms & Devices → and then select the Thermostat X, at the very bottom I have the link here. If you don’t see that, you sure yours is a Thermostat X?

10

Are you using the tado iPad or iPhone app? The “Device linking” option seems to be missing on iPad. iPhone is fine for me.

11

@agners questions:

  1. If you add it via the app, do you get all the functions just like with the tado V3+? I think i’m gonna add it both ways anyway (via the tado app and via HA matter).
  2. Can i also buy the version without bridge, because on several web stores they say it’s an expansion.
12

To answer my own questions.

  1. Yes it has all the functionalities if you add it in the tado app. Via matter is only the temperature and humidity.

  2. Yes you can buy it without bridge

1 Like
13

Sounds good. How did you add it to HA though?

14

Hello, great review. Where in the tado App can you Share the device / Handover to the HA Matter Controller…i cant find this option… Android…?

15

@luchtgitaar1 @kaihawaii In the tado app go to “settings” → “rooms and devices”. Then tap on the tado x thermostat. On the next screen, at the bottom, tap on “pair device”.

16

Got it. Thanks a lot

17

The integration of Tado X devices via Matter over Thread does not seem to work when using an Echo 4 as a Thread Border Router.

When I try to connect the devices to the Tado app first, it tells me that I need a Thread Border Router even though I have an Echo 4. Do I still have to explicitly mark the Echo 4 as a Thread Border Router in the Tado app? If so, how?

When I try to connect the devices to Home Assistant first, Home Assistant tells me that the device needs a Thread Border Router even though I have an Echo 4. My Echo 4 Thread network is also only displayed in Home Assistant as “Other network”, but not as “Preferred network”.
So I first connected the Tado X devices to the Echo 4 Thread network in the Alexa app, then shared the connection with Home Assistant. This worked, but as described by the thread author, I can no longer connect the devices to the Tado app.

Update:
The Tado support page states that currently only Apple devices work as non-Tado Thread Border routers.
However, @agners said that he had integrated the Tado X devices using a SkyConnect stick.

18

It is also working with nest hub devices as non-Tado Thread Border routers. That’s what I did. I have an android ecosystem.

1 Like
19

I have now bought a SkyConnect Stick and after several restarts of the smartphone and factory resets of the Tado X devices, all devices could finally be set up.

By the way, I had to do this too: Pure HA+Thread, "Border Router required" - #16 by WallyR
So maybe it would have worked with the Echo 4 after all. But for me it’s okay that I’ve now bought a SkyConnect stick because I want to gradually get rid of the Echos and Alexa anyway.

As @agners has already mentioned, all the additional functions are missing. For me personally, the window open detection would be enough as a sensor. Everything else can also be built with automations or with Better Thermostat directly in Home Assistant.

20

Hi a question here. I was interested in changing the heating based on energy tariff. Tado heatpump optimizer X supports this with a subscription (a bit too much and don’t want to depend on the cloud). There is no machine learning yet in Home-assistant to do this task :frowning: but maybe an automation could try to do this, but I guess it would be hard to optimize with an automation. If the temperature drops too much it cost more energy to warm up and other factors and comfort are hard to build into an automation.

My question is the control and sensor information good enough to setup/train a local ML network?
What are al the reading you can get from the Heating Pump?

I was before looking at Ngenic Tune - smart thermostat helps you save energy and money – Ngenic
But this has also depended on the cloud. You can do a onetime payment. But still if the service stops working than you have nothing.
Tado looks a better option now as it has some local support.