What are the most reliable behind-switch WiFi switches?

Hardware
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Hi All,

I have x4 Aeotec Dual Nano Switches at home which use Z-Wave technology. I have found these to be very unreliable and have lost confidence in Z-Wave entirely. They keep dropping off the network and even when they’re alive the delay is significant if it works at all.

I actually have a very comprehensive Ubiquiti WiFi network at home and as these are hardwired I see no point in not using WiFi in this case.

The question is, which WiFi switches are best?

  1. I want switches that are rock solid reliable on WiFi.
  2. Operate on LAN. I don’t mind if I need internet to set them up though.
  3. Can be configured to switch programmatically and not break the circuit as well as simply breaking the circuit. This is because I have a mixture of smart lights and normal lights in my house so the use case would depend on the circuit.
  4. Must be able to accomidate two circuits per unit.

I am in the UK.

These are my my favourite options so far:
Shelly Plus 2PM - A bit expensive and large but looks like a good option.
Sonoff MINIR4 - Well priced and conveniently small but I’m doubting the LAN functionality.

What’s the best option out there?

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One word. Shelly.

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But Money :sob:
£30 per switch!!

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Fixing the issues you have with your zwave network.

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I thought you said “reliable” not “cheap”.

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Not helpful.

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Fair enough!

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Welp. You asked for the best option in your situation. You don’t want to spend money, as you told Nick. The best option is to fix the issues you have with your current setup. Because what you described is not normal.

But you do your thing.

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Z-Wave has been so frustrating for me and as far as I can tell I’ve done everything right. Range is so small, Sonoff USB Antenna on solid firmware, Many devices relay, only 2 hops, yet still just these Aeotec bastards fall off the network. Other hardware is fine.

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As I said, this is not normal behavior at all. Your priority should be trouble shooting this rather than ripping it all out and spending money on other technologies that come with their own problems. Correctly configured zwave network are amongst the most reliable and solid IoT networks you can find. Range is going to be a lot better than wifi. That’s just physics.

Huh ? Does Sonoff make a zwave dongle ?

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To be clear I’m not questioning my Z-Wave network. I’m questioning the Duel Nano Switches as I say again they’re the only devices I have a problem with.

Sorry, you’re correct this is what I’m using Z-Stick 7 – Aeotec

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Range is so small? WTH is wrong with your setup? Fix it!
Range of 800 something MHz network will allways superseed any Zigbee/WiFi 2.4 GHz solution by physics law…

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I have the feeling that your z-wave stick has issues somewhere, not necessarily those nano switches being the problem.

So if I were you, I would go with Shelly to fix the burning issues at hand. That would be 100+ quid for 4 of those.

And when I have time, I definitely would go back and look into this z-stick. What’s your firmware version? Here’s mine.
image
A replacement z-wave stick would be had at around 30~40.

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I have 3 dual nano switches in a network of approx 12 devices and it has been rock solid.

However it was not rock solid initially, one fibaro device was playing up and that caused the whole network to lag and be unreliable.

I replaced the faulty module and ever since zwave has been great.

Is it possible one of your nano switches is faulty? Is one particularly slow or temperamental?