ZigBee Range

Hardware
1

As I expand out my Home Assistant environment I am wondering about getting some ZigBee devices, but I have a question on the range of ZigBee…

My HA Host is running on a Raspberry Pi which is located in my detached garage about 25 feet from my house. WiFi from the house just reaches the Pi.

Would the range of ZigBee be suitable to reach from the Pi into the house (brick walls)?

Thanks

2

Probably it will but signal will be weak.

3

I would not count on that.

But, you can get an ethernet Zigbee device like SLZB-06 Zigbee Ethernet PoE LAN USB WiFi Adapter CC2652P | Zigbee2MQTT | Home Assistant | SMLIGHT | SMLIGHT Official Homepage

4

Real world range is about 6 to 8 meters (20 to 26 feet), without brick walls. With two brick walls that range will drop sharply.

If you have a wired network in the house then buy a (wired) network connected Zigbee coordinator such as the ZigStar UZG or Tube’s range.

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5

Before I moved to the UZG-01 (network connected, not USB) I had my USB-based coordinator in my detached garage 10-15 meters from my house. I added some outdoor lighting with Hue bulbs in them on both the garage and my house and the range and coverage was never any issue. My house and garage are wooden though.

6

Thanks guys. I do have wired network in the house and also PoE, so it looks like my best option is to put a Zigbee coordinator in the middle of the house.

I assume the communication will then be via ethernet from the coordinator to the Pi in the garage ?

7

Correct, it’s over ethernet.

8

Yes  

9

I have the ConBee controller located in a second floor room and I easily control devices in a detached building 90 feet away. The signal is passing 2 interior walls and one outside wall before it’s getting to the devices in the interior of the detached building. Signal strength is between 160 and 252.

10

Since it appears you have a good ethernet run between your garage and at least one point in your house, so you do have options. That said, the idea of a zigbee mesh network is get several routers around your physical space that lets you install zigbee devices anywhere. I would leave your coordinator attached to your HA server in the garage and place some reliable and reliably powered zigbee routers around your house. As long as am spending your coin :wink: I’d do the same for your wifi coverage with with one of the new mesh wifi 6+ or 7 setup on one of the holiday sales. You want to be able to mesh in wifi 6 based IoT devices going forward as they appear.

The idea is to have a nice blanket across your whole physical space to you can stand up new device anywhere anytime.

Good hunting!

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11

Don’t worry about spending my coin - I do a pretty good job of that :slight_smile:

Yes I have good ethernet between garage and house. Also already got a Mesh WiFi network in the house and about to extend into the garage.

I am thinking my first move into ZigBee will be a PoE Coordinator in my loft in the middle of the house. That hopefully will get good coverage to try some ZigBee devices and then extend from there as needed. Spend the coin slowly (but surely) :smile:

12

Remember that the coordinator and each router have limited numbers of connections, so the idea is the mesh, not one big hub and spoke.

Have fun with the coin, and don’t forget to allocate some of it to :wine_glass: :beer: :grinning:

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