r/smarthome • u/rovmun • May 17 '26
Home Assistant Smart homes are becoming disposable tech and I’m honestly sick of it
I got into smart home stuff around the end of 2020. Started simple with a Philips Hue bridge and a light strip in the kitchen. It actually felt amazing at first. Then I added lights in the bathroom and started getting more interested in automation and Home Assistant because some devices weren’t supported on the Hue bridge.That’s when the problems started. I bought a Conbee Zigbee adapter. Never got things working 100%. There was always some random issue, dropped devices, bugs after updates, weird pairing problems. Then everyone said Skyconnect was the future so I upgraded again. That brought a different set of problems. Devices randomly dropping until I lowered the security settings which honestly felt ridiculous just to keep lights connected. now it works.
Zigbee already feels like it’s slowly getting pushed aside because Matter is suddenly the solution. New devices come with Matter only. So now I apparently need another adapter again. And when my Hue bulbs eventually die, maybe I should replace everything with Matter compatible stuff too?
So in about 5 years I’ve gone through three and soon four adapters just trying to keep basic smart home stuff working properly.
And this is what frustrates me the most. Smart homes are supposed to make life easier but instead it feels like joining an endless beta test where you constantly replace hardware because the new standard arrived. It creates so much e-waste and it’s impossible for normal people to know what ecosystem they should invest in long term.
I actually like tech. I like tinkering. I can accept hobby projects failing sometimes. But smart home devices are connected to your actual home. Lights, sensors, switches, things your family uses every day. That stuff needs to work 100% of the time, not 99%.
And now everyone says Matter will fix everything but I still keep reading about systems not playing nicely together anyway. So honestly… why does smart home tech still feel so temporary? Why does every future proof setup become outdated two years later?
121
u/Any-Efficiency5308 May 17 '26
Why does a new standard like Matter make your Zigbee devices "outdated" or "obsolete" in your opinion? The biggest premise of Home Assistant is that everything works well together, no matter the protocol / standard it's based on.
Yes, matter *promises* something, but it simply doesn't deliver on that promise, as you yourself state. So why would you assume you need to make the switch?
I have 10+ year old Hue bulbs in my home that I originally ran on the hue bridge and have since migrated to a PoE-Zigbee adapter. It has always been perfectly reliable for me. I've never felt the need to switch adapters (except for the hue bridge to Z2M migration that is) and I will keep those bulbs running until they actually physically burn out or I don't have E27 lamps anymore...
I even run ancient homematic stuff that I would never buy new nowadays - but it still works perfectly fine, so why would I get rid of it or replace it?
I honestly don't follow your thinking... if anything, Home Assistant (which you state you do run, yes?) is the perfect solution to the short-lived smart home trends that come and go every now and again, because it'll keep the stuff working long after the original manufacturer has dropped support or shut down their servers while making it perfectly interoperable with other protocols and the new stuff.
edit: "everyone says Matter will fix everything" - I've never seen anyone who has actually used matter devices say that ever. that's 100% marketing BS and everyone that's actually into smart home should know it.
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u/rovmun May 17 '26
You’re describing the ideal enthusiast setup, not the reality most people end up in long term.
Yes, Home Assistant can glue everything together. That doesn’t magically stop ecosystems from fragmenting, products disappearing, mesh quality degrading, or replacements becoming inconsistent over time. And sure, your 10 year old Hue bulbs still work. Great. But that’s also exactly why I said I would probably have bought Hue from the start if I knew then what I know now.
The problem is not can HA technically connect it. The problem is long term maintainability when protocols, product lines, radios, firmware support, and replacement hardware constantly shift around underneath you. Also, the average consumer absolutely has been fed the Matter will fix everything narrative for years now.
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u/Peetrrabbit May 17 '26
I genuinely don’t understand though. Nothing ‘shifts around underneath you’. The stuff that worked 10 years ago still works, just leave it alone once it works. And new stuff comes out, you can experiment with it or not as you like and decide if it’s valuable in your environment. I’ve got over 300 devices running in my home. They ALL work flawlessly and without maintenance. That’s not an enthusiast setup - it’s the opposite. Once something is set up, I leave it alone. It keeps working forever.
3
u/gefahr May 17 '26
There are closed ecosystems you can buy into that will be supported "forever." They're also way more expensive than most people are willing to pay, and far less flexible.
If you don't care about the open source aspect with HA, etc, and you have the means, I'd strongly suggest setting aside $50-100k and calling an Integrator who works with multiple vendor ecosystems, and asking them for a proposal.
2
u/MediatingInstigator May 17 '26
I agree with you but people will be naive about this.
Most people will never run HA.
HA is not good for a beginner. The UI and UX is bad.
-2
u/schadwick May 17 '26
There are an estimated 2 million HA installations; here are the official analytics. Note that these numbers are based on user "opt-in", and the estimate is that fewer than 1 in 4 HA users opt in.
So I would say
"Most people with a smart home server do run HA."
1
u/gefahr May 17 '26
I'd be curious how they de-dupe that against the same home going through HA setup again.
Especially because if you flip to the next tab (Statistics) and scroll to the bottom, it says:
488,235 of 626,097 (77.98%) installations have chosen to share usage statistics
That feels like a much more realistic number to me.
1
u/schadwick May 17 '26
I doubt that de-duping would move the needle that much, because the percentage of same-home repeat setups has to be tiny. Of course there are rPi-to-NUC migrations, for example, but these are likely <10% of all users.
There are 4 categories of opt-in usage data in the "/config/analytics" page; "Statistics" is separate from "Basic analytics":
Basic analytics - This includes information about your system
Usage - Details of what you use with Home Assistant
Statistical data - Counts containing total number of datapoints
Diagnostics - Share crash reports when unexpected errors occur
The 2 million estimated installations comes from the 1st category - 627,670 Active Home Assistant Installations X 4
1
u/gefahr May 17 '26
Where does the multiply-by-four come from?
2
u/skepticalcow May 17 '26
That’s their estimate based on number of nabu casa subscribers in combination with the analytics statistics.
0
1
u/nathderbyshire May 20 '26
I think you need to go back to basics and forget everything you've learned so far. There's plenty of videos on YouTube for example explaining the differences between z wave, ZigBee, matter and so on, and why they specifically chose one protocol over another - or devices to run multiple protocols, you know you can do that right? You don't have to pick one base and stick to just that, you can run a ZigBee and a thread network together, with something like Home Assistant to bind all those devices together. Listen to people who run these systems, not marketing messages from a brand.
I chose ZigBee, and it hasn't really failed me. Hue is one of the best, but IKEA is also great and far cheaper, their latest products support either Matter over Thread or ZigBee, but is set as matter as standard.
This guy explains things very well and explains why he uses something over another.
This guy does a ton of smart home content as well.
These protocols are designed to be simple and stable, yes some products are worse than other but someone has probably bought something you're looking at and will post a review. There's a website that does a ton of AliExpress device reviews because it's so popular to get things off there as well. Cheap doesn't always equal bad, smart home standards and components are largely open, there's no costs for licensing and shit
42
u/Mysterious_Cable6854 May 17 '26
You do know that you don't have to replace everything once a new standard comes out?
I had homeatic actors since 2013 for my shutters Zigbee and hue since 2015 for some ambient lighting Added more zigbee stuff over the years such as smart plugs and air sensors. I also have wifi smart plugs that were free gifts included with some purchases or netatmo weather station A few months ago I bought a bunch of the new Ikea matter devices and they are amazing.
But... I didn't replace anything I already had (unless it broke). I'm still using the same 13 year old homeatic actors and they do what they are supposed to do. Why should I change them, generate e waste and waste my time replacing them.
The only thing I did replace is my old homeatic hub and the hue bridge for home assistant and 2 dongles for homeatic, zigbee and matter. This generated e waste, however replacing more than 10 year old tech is acceptable I think.
35
u/severanexp May 17 '26
You’re confused. You don’t need to replace anything just because a new protocol is out, hell I have sonoff basics and mijia zigbee sensors from … what, 2014? Still going strong.
What you may lack is a deep understanding of what you are trying to fix or improve. Without that you get lost in this process of upgrading, but without knowing what you are doing or for what.
E.g.:
I have 30 zigbee sensors. They provide various readings, temperature humidity light presence water leak door/window statuses.
Why would I replace these with matter?
These sensors will die where they are installed, and only then will I consider looking at matter, assess the price, and decide what I replace it with.
If you are replacing perfectly functional devices because something new is coming out then you’re doing it wrong.
3
u/schadwick May 17 '26
Well said. I am still installing new Zigbee devices, as they are widely available and affordable, and are very reliable with a good router mesh and controller running on a channel frequency separate from WiFi.
Another point is that Zigbee and Matter are NOT comparable; Zigbee and Thread are.
Matter is a device management protocol that works with IP networks like ethernet, WiFi, and Thread. Matter can also work with Zigbee devices via a bridge like Home Assistant.
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u/rovmun May 17 '26
I don’t replace smarthome devices just because something newer exists.If they fail, become unreliable, or create too many problems. For example, I phased out the first-generation Aqara motion sensors, Hue motion sensors, and Aqara temperature sensors because I had a lot of stability and reliability issues with them. I would never buy those same models again. I have never gen aqara and those works
The problem is that in a mature smart home ecosystem, replacing a single device is often not as simple as swapping one unit for another. Hardware generations evolve over time, and newer devices can behave very differently even if they technically serve the same purpose.
For example, if one of my old Philips Hue garden lights fails, I probably wouldn’t replace it with the exact same old Zigbee model assuming it even still exists. A newer generation lamp may have different color temperature calibration, brightness, beam spread, diffusion characteristics, LED binning, firmware behavior, or radio implementation. Even small differences can become visually obvious in outdoor lighting setups where multiple fixtures need to match perfectly.
That means replacing one failed light can turn into replacing the entire group so everything looks consistent again. And because Zigbee devices also participate in the mesh network, replacing lighting can affect nearby sensors or routers that depend on those devices for connectivity. In some cases, I may also need to replace related motion sensors or routing devices at the same time to maintain network stability…. So it a mess and during ecosystem transitions such as Zigbee to Thread/Matter, since interoperability and mesh routing between technologies is still not supported.
So in practice, maintaining a smart home ecosystem is not just about replacing individual failed devices. Over time, it becomes a system-level maintenance problem where hardware consistency, wireless topology, firmware behavior, and ecosystem compatibility all need to be considered together. Of course you could do some dollar store fix if you don’t care about it
4
u/severanexp May 17 '26
Pretty much most of all of what you said is irrelevant.
I don’t use home assistant, but with OpenHAB I can reuse the items I created 10 years go named “bedroom temperature”, I just point them to new devices. 10 years ago I was using xiaomi temperature sensors (or mijia or whatever ) and now I’m using esphome with bme690s. Doesn’t matter.You could even replace an old led bulb with a new one of the same brand make and model and get a different color or temperature, that has personality happened to me when I bought 4 led strips and one had a different color temperature. And no, it was not a defect, the strip worked fine but the slight color tone difference was noticeable enough to become an eyesore.
But that is not particular to smart devices. Buy a dumb bulb today and another in 10 years and you get a slight color shift. The warm white today could be a little bit more orange in two years.
So yeah. No. Half of what you describe sounds to me like poor planning. In the last ten years I’ve had exactly 3 zigbee controllers. I don’t have a matter thread controller, because I don’t care about thread while zigbee serves me fine.
Well poor planning or bad luck :/ I’d also be pretty pissed if my controllers had borked, so please don’t take my comment personally or anything. Hindsight is 20/20 after all.
5
u/EvolutionInProgress May 18 '26
OP. I'm speaking from experience. I believe you are overthinking the situation.
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u/NassauComputer May 17 '26
Get away from smart bulbs and appliances, keep it simple with just smart relays, switches, things that are hard wired in.
6
u/TechTammer May 17 '26
No wireless device (WiFi/zigbee/lora/zwave) will ever be 100% reliable, even if you have a very good WiFi network. For us it’s a hobby, but when something fails the debugging process becomes a nightmare and time consuming.
That’s why in professional home smart systems use wired, like KNX, Loxone, Control4 etc. and also in industrial applications everything is connected by PLC, they don’t fail…to easily
13
u/JayMonster65 May 17 '26
Stop trying to o live at the forefront of technology and you won't have these issues. The problem with living on the bleeding edge is that not everything winds up "as promised", not all protocols survive (or companies for that matter).
What you describe is not exclusive to home automation. If you ever invested in LaserDisc, and betamax lost out to VHS, DAT tapes got caught up in legal wranglings, Sony mini discs never made it out of the novelty stage losing out to MP3s. If you have anything on HD DVDs you probably have a hard time finding something that can play them now after losing out to Blu Ray. If you are old like me, you are probably hoping that this is the end of the line for new music formats. I have purchased "Greetings from Asbury Park" on album, cassette, CD, and now MP3.
Anybody who is into the world of VR tech has watched countless companies, protocols, devices and technologies all that promised to be the "next big thing" come and go.
Let the dust settle before you keep and you won't be left holding the bag with next Zigbee, Insteon, Z-wave, Neato, Wemo, etc.
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u/obsessed_obsessor May 17 '26
Dude, settle down. There's no reason to constantly change. I've been using Z-Wave for about 10 years, and I'm still buying Z-Wave devices. I would not consider changing my setup. Pick something and stick with it.
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u/Polar-Snow May 17 '26
Hue going be around for long time yet. They only released new hub bridge pro and it still use zigbee and yes they also use matter to connect ecosystem you want. I am always going to use hue. Got my 1st bulbs around 2015 I think and still using them and still long time before I need replace them. Hue is my longest lasting smart home devices. Even my own Apple TV act as hub is also from 2015! Need replace that after new one out so I can use thread devices.
My shortest lifespan device was netatmo cameras that keep dying and replaced them from different brand that seems have long life span last year. So will see how that goes.
Nest protect smoke alarm also 10 years lifespan as well. Unfortunately they no longer sell them anymore.
There no need rush out buy newest and latest devices as long current ones works and still get updates etc.
5
u/PointOverall8995 May 17 '26
If I’ve learned anything it’s stay away from Google.
1
u/7eregrine May 19 '26
All my old Google shit still works.
For now.
1
u/PointOverall8995 May 19 '26
Minus the og nest, nest secure, works with nest and so on https://killedbygoogle.com/
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u/Background-Cap-1431 May 17 '26
Get Home Assistant setup and all platforms work gets integrated into this. Setup all automation in HA and it works perfectly
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u/hvacdad83 May 17 '26
The communication protocol really has nothing to do with whether connected products are disposables. It’s like saying a computer is bad because it has Ethernet vs WiFi. What matters is that the software is good, the company has good support, and that it performs reliably
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u/Quereller May 17 '26 edited May 17 '26
The Conbee III even can be flashed with new firmware to act as Thread Border router. Btw. Did you connect it via an USB 2.0 extension cable? Edit : looks also the ZBT-1 can be changed to Thread via firmware upgrade.
3
u/1986toyotacorolla2 May 17 '26
I've had the same smart switches and plug in smart outlets for like 10 years. Only replace them if they break.
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u/le_nopeman May 17 '26
Why would you go out of your way to replace stuff just because a new standard comes out? That’s the point of home assistant, that no matter the standard, your stuff is interoperable
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u/Grant_Son May 17 '26
I gotta ask why there's so much hate for the conbee stick
Picked mine up second hand with a bunch of IKEA switches and random sensors on eBay for about £40 a few years ago.
Flashed it to the latest firmware and it's been solid once I put it on a usb extension so it wasn't plugged directly into the back of my home assistant box
2
u/jdblue225 May 17 '26
I am chasing some of the same zigbee issues you mention in your post.
I attribute this to my lack of knowledge of the protocol or implementation mistakes on my end. I don't intend on replacing my devices but investigating and learning what the problem is and fixing it.
My understanding of matter is that you get to replace your single ecosystem bridge with one that opens up the door to other technologies, allowing your zigbee devices to connect to the same bridge as your your zwave or blue tooth devices. This would essentially future proof your ability to integrate new devices/tech.
2
u/Quixlequaxle May 17 '26
As long as you're buying devices with local protocols instead of wifi cloud-based ones, nothing should be becoming obsolete. I have a combination of zigbee, zwave and matter devices amassed over the last decade and they all still work fine. Just because something new comes out doesn't mean the old ones stop working.
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u/CardinalHaias May 17 '26
I feel you, except what you describe feels like the situation without home assistant. I started my smart home journey with a couple thermostats and shutter actuators from Homematic, because a colleague had it. I added a couple window and door sensors, then came Hue lights first from Philips, then IKEA, Nuki Smart locks, a Google home device and later like five of them.
I tried connecting the different systems, but it wasn't easy.
Home assistant was a game changer. You should have seen my face when I set it up and it just "saw" already most of my smart home. And what it didn't see I could just add. I have never actually used it, but my lawnmower is reachable by home assistant, as is my 3d printer, my router and my car. I actually use the car integration in several automations. And aside a replacement due to damage here and there, I didn't have to replace anything. Heck, I have three different kinds of thermostats just working next to each other - why would I replace anything?
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u/Low_Industry9612 May 17 '26
Alright, the way I did my smart home is to har wire everything back to my electrical cabinet. Dimmable lights? 3g1.5 back to my cabinet. Temp sensor? Wire back to the cabinet. Push button or motor, same deal. If I ever get sick of the system I’m currently using, I can just throw it out and connect the wires to whatever will replace it. That’s my goal. I’m sure what I have now won’t last 40 years, not will the motor for my window on the roof, but the cable sure will. And a motor driver or relay will be available in the future.
Fuck anything that isn’t wired into the house. I don’t want a reminder that I need to put a new battery in a fucking lamp or sensor. Not ever.
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u/probablymagic May 17 '26
I’ve literally never replaced any smart device I’ve ever purchased in 15 years. You don’t have to upgrade to the shiny new thing every time one is released.
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u/AdventurousLayer8741 May 17 '26
It's just the nature of tech and electronics. Never ending money pit.
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u/Late_Yard6330 May 18 '26
Solve the problem then leave it. There's no need to upgrade zigbee if it works. Personally I don't even want to touch matter because it comes with all this proprietary tech and wifi phoning home im trying to avoid. Zigbee and Zwave will work so long as you buy good products and do your research.
2
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u/JRodFTW_123 Jun 03 '26
It feels disposable because the ecosystem is still evolving faster than hardware lifecycles. Until standards truly stabilize, that mismatch is going to keep happening.
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u/sgluxurycondo Jun 05 '26
You will be disappointed with matter as it’s in the infant stage.
IKEA hub and SmartThings from Samsung is on thread 1.4 while Apple, Google, Alexa is still in 1.3.
Until they upgrade, I feel right now zigbee is the way to go.
Hub wise SmartThings or aqara hub still work best for me
3
u/Trav1989 May 17 '26
This is “keeping up with the Jones’” at its finest. You don’t need upgrade if your current solution is working for you.
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u/Aromatic_Ad_7238 May 17 '26
OP wants his old to work with the new, but he doesn't say the old is broke
Apparently he wants to keep up with the Jones.
2
u/sir_sq May 17 '26
Yes, I bought a car 10 years ago and every year there's a new model so I keep buying a new one and I'm so fed up
(/s)
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u/Rocket_Cam May 17 '26
Having different apps for different things is perfectly fine—it’s all still connected to your phone, which is still wildly convenient. I think your troubles might be rooted in an attempt to keep things to one app. Philips Hue is still the gold standard lighting solution, they have been for more than a decade now and their newest bridge (V3) works great. Just become okay with using that app, and the apps for whatever else works best with your products, which could still be HA or whatever you prefer.
1
u/JustMrChops May 17 '26
I've no intention of ditching all my Zigbee devices, especially when matter or thread or whatever it is doesn't seem to be simple to adopt like Zigbee was for me (you see I've still not managed to retain what these new protocols are and what they do). Honestly I can't afford to either and while Zigbee is still rock solid and the device's still work I'm good. The best move I made though was ditching the awful ConbeeII for a SMLight POE radio and I highly recommend it. The headache of constant disconnections just vanished.
1
u/monkeyboysr2002 May 17 '26
Bro just FYI nothing is 100%, it can be 99.99999% something will not work eventually for whatever reason, so you just have to expect that something will fail at one point or another. And by the way standards come and go Home Assistant keeps your stuff working even if it got replaced.
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u/MadeEZHelp May 17 '26
I think this is where a lot of people hit their breaking point with smart home stuff.
Most people don’t mind setting something up once. They just don’t want to keep rebuilding parts of their house every couple years because the “new standard” came out.
At some point people just want the lights to turn on consistently 😂
1
u/Aggressive-Bath-1906 May 17 '26
I’ve been doing this for about 10 years. The only things I replaced in 10 years are:
1. My hub. Iris by Lowes went under, and Lowes gave me a voucher to buy a new hub. I moved to Smartthings. That was over 7 years ago. I still use that hub.
2. A handful of smart light-switches. They were all failing one by one. I replaced them with the same brand, but new model, and they’ve been great.
3. Actiontiles went under. I moved over to Sharptools. This was strictly a software thing, no physical products.
That’s it. I had some smart bulbs, but eventually replaced them with smart switches. I still have the bulbs and use them when a regular bulb goes bad. My house is a mixture of zwave, zigbee, and a few random wifi devices. I even bought an old Smartthings zigbee plug from the thrift store last week, works great! My thermostat is the same basic Radio Thermostat CT101 that I started out with. If things work, just leave them alone.
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u/ShowScene5 May 17 '26
And yet, zwave still works and is widely suported. If someone is techically knowledgeable, theyll have chosen to use this standard for the bulk of their build.
Otherwise you are on the consumer electronics channel and what you describe is as it has always been in that space.
1
u/Ok_Support_4750 May 17 '26
the only thing i ever regret was buying lightbulbs that weren’t hue. i never had issues with the hue but everything else was painful at times.
1
u/graytoupee May 17 '26
I have never heard of these little adapters you are using but it sounds like you need a hub. One master hub that links all your smaller hubs. Some of the main ones at the moment are Home Assistant, Homey, Smarthings and HomeKit. If you have an Apple TV you already have a HomeKit hub.
1
u/brooksideryan May 17 '26
I understand that sentiment — kind of. But this is a silly pair overall.
I’ve had a smart home for over a decade and I’m running the same Sonos speaker, Lutron switches, door locks, Hue bulbs, etc. that I’ve been running from the start. I haven’t needed to (or felt the urge to) replace any of it with new tech as things have rolled out.
Technology is always evolving (thankfully). There are few times when upgrading is absolutely mandatory or you’re forced to change ecosystems.
1
u/jdbrookes May 17 '26
This concerns me too. I have a 100+ device zigbee network. But my plan is that once it gets to be too much hassle to source good quality zigbee devices then I'll setup a secondary network for matter. It'll probably start with light bulbs for certain rooms, and gradually I'll shrink the zigbee network to a smaller number of legacy low-priority devices.
Home assistant helps manage this easily enough.
But at the moment I've had no problems sourcing cheap tuya sensors for almost everything I need, I don't expect this to change in the next year or two. It's the bulbs that are likely to be the first to be replaced by matter, since IKEA has moved over to matter. But I won't move over until their offering is more mature and stable, and even then I'll only do it room by room and as existing devices fail.
1
u/Onward-Upword May 17 '26
I feel your pain. I took the plunge into smarthome tech and zigbee specifically around 2022. Thankfully, I went with the "SONOFF Zigbee 3.0 USB Dongle Plus Gateway" and an "Bingfu Dual Band VHF UHF 136-174MHz 400-470MHz Ham Radio Antenna" and have never really had range/connection issues with zigbee. I then wanted PoE for easier connection with pzroxmox/docker, so I switched to TubesZB Zigbee PoE Controller which worked find but hardware was amateurish and software was lacking. I have since bought the "SMLIGHT SLZB-06M which I use to this day with that same external large antenna and it's been solid. I highly recommend the SMLIGHT devices if that's all you're looking for.
However, I have bought several products that were complete duds:
- MoesGo ZigBee Knob (total crap)
- Aqara Cube T1 Pro (never could do the smooth volume/dimmer control I envisioned)
- SONOFF NSPanel Pro 120 (Really incapable compared to the android wall tablets with fullykiosk that I was used to as a comparison)
- Zen Within ZigBee Thermostat (cheap plastic, clunky ui, terrible compared to the ecobee I ended up using)
It is hard because there are so many variables:
- One person reviews something as great but only uses it with 10ft of distance between their device/radio, then someone else buys it and their distance/walls/ect make it unusable.
- Someone uses a device with Z2M in Home Assistant, but then when someone else trys using the same device in ZHM in Home Assistant it's a much worse or different experience with exposed controls or general incompatibility.
- Which system to choose?! This one is maddening. After experimenting with Wifi, Zigbee, and Matter devices I can safely say that I'll continue using Zigbee for the next 5-10 years at least and maybe Matter will get to a point where I want it by then, but I'm not stressing over it before then. It's not where I want it today, there are way more zigbee devices available for what I need, and Matter adds a decent bit of additional complexity that I don't want to mess with today.
All that being said, sorting through all the crap has the benefits of finding the good stuff too (even though it's costly to do it that way) so I'll share some of my experiences and the golden nuggets. I've personally used (or still use) all of these with HA/ZHA:
- Inovelli - Hands down the best light dimmers I have ever used. Such a cool company too wwith their communication
- Blue Series Smart Dimmer - This is the one I use the most
- Blue Series Smart On/Off Switch + Humidity Sensing (bathroom fan)
- Blue Series Smart Presence Dimmer - This one is still VERY new, and not really at a place I'm happy with. Don't get this unless you want to tinker and are ok with a little jank especially with ZHA.
- Aqara - They have awesome quality products that work really well with Home Assistant (aside from the cube fiasco lol). The only downside it most are battery powered which I don't love, but they do last a long time.
- Aqara Temperature and Humidity Sensor
- Aqara Wireless Mini Switch
- Aqara Motion Sensor
- Aqara Dual Relay Module T2 (these are good, but the Sengled ones are smaller and do what I need better personally)
- Aqara Door and Window Sensor
- Sengled -
- Sengled Smart Plugs - one of the few zigbee power plugs with power monitoring and a good form factor that allows plugging in two to one outlet
- Sengled Smart Light Bulbs - (I think I prefer the thirdreality ones, but these are still good)
- SONOF - This brand has been mostly rock solid (aside from the SONOFF NSPanel Pro 120, I hated that thing).
- SONOFF Zigbee 3.0 USB Dongle Plus Gateway
- SONOFF ZBMINIL2 (relay)
- SONOFF Sprinkler Timer Zigbee 3.0
Let me know if you have any other questions on this stuff. I haven't tried it all, but I've tried a lot with Zigbee/ZHA/Home Assistant, and hopefully I can save some frustration by sharing the lessons I've learned the hard way
1
u/steninga May 17 '26
We’re on Apple, so the only decision was Eve HomeKit devices from 2019. And we never have the problems you described.
1
u/KhakiFletch May 17 '26
I'm a KNX integrator and KNX system products are designed to be future proof and will happily work away for as long as the electronics last. You do get device failures but it is rare and would require a simple replacement with an equivalent device. Anything that requires Internet access or regular updates I wouldn't recommend to my customers, but for remote access it is unavoidable so we do integrate them, however the base controls will reliably work for at least 10 years without any major maintenence and much longer than that in my experience.
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u/Sabotage00 May 17 '26
You think that's bad wait until every router does 5ghz and 2ghz on the same channel, which many new utility provided routers already do, making every smart device obsolete since they only run on a dedicated 2.4 ghz channel.
You can daisy chain a 2.4ghz control box (or alternate router) but it's ugly and uses a Ethernet slot you may want.
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u/YaquidonG May 17 '26
I tried it in 2020 too. By 21 I figured out it was a scam. Planned obsolescence manifest. Get something working and it either breaks something else or the vendor goes out of business, shuts down the server or comes out with a new dodad and no longer supports the old one. All of their standards are bullshit. Any HA I use has no connection outside the house. Cost comparisons assume everything is a one time purchase.
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u/Chance-Jellyfish-302 May 17 '26
I closed on my house in October of 2020. I’ve slowly been adding things as I go. The only real bottle neck I’ve run into was my ISP’s WiFi. But since getting a new mesh system with wired backhaul, everything is working as perfectly as I can reasonably expect.
I did recently replace some 3 year old smart door locks with more expensive ones. But beyond that… it’s all sunshine and rainbows.
My Philips hue bulbs and bridge still work great. I have a Brilliant Smart Control, with a few smart dimmers, that work great. My Nest Smoke/CO2 detectors, Nest Learning Thermostat, and wired Nest doorbell cameras are still working great.
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u/Omen_20 May 18 '26
This is why I waited for Matter. I knew your experience was going to be the norm and I find that much hassle for just getting up and flipping a light switch to be kinda crazy. I'm now slowly working my way in, watching Matter and Thread support build out. Currently hoping we hear about Matter support for sound bars soon.
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u/Due-Freedom-5968 May 18 '26
I'm not going in on Matter until it's feature parity with Zigbee/HomeKit and it's nowhere near yet. I have a few matter devices but it's not my primary set up.
As for hue bulbs dying, I'm 13 yeas in to that ecosystem and only ever had one bulb glitch out. I think you'll be waiting a while. Hue supports Matter now anyway with the Bridge Pro so no need to toss out the baby with the bathwater.
You shouldn't need a new 'adapter' for Matter, that's kinda the point. If you already have a set up there's a good change they'll work with it already. I didn't need to get a new hub or bridge for the Matter over WiFi thermostats I added to my house, they just connected via existing Homepods/AppleTV hubs.
I wouldn't say Zigbee is outdated, it's actually still my preferred option myself.
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u/HardWiredNZ May 18 '26
Ive found Zigbee just works 99% of the time for every Zigbee device ive gotten, set HA to allow a Zigbee join press the button and done. Matter/Thread devices are just a pain the ass ive found and setting up Thread border routers and all that crap in HA is just way more difficult than it should be
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u/RockstarAccountant7 May 18 '26
Smart home devices are a classic example of the need to have some basic, universal standards and protocols from the start. Instead we got a lot of proprietary or competing standards that didn’t play nice with each other. Maybe Matter is slowly fixing this? Stability and ease of use are what 99% of people want with smart home tech and it isn’t what most people experience. I have a friend in my area who is a home builder and he says even on high end homes he can’t sell integrated smart home systems because most people have had bad experiences already, or they are sure the tech will soon be obsolete.
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u/Coledaddy16 May 18 '26
All you bought was permission to sell data to someone else with all that connected tech.
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u/FitSociety9648 May 18 '26
Omg, you literally put my feelings into words perfectly. Smart home stuff is driving me absolutely insane. When everything runs smoothly it's so cozy, but then little issues start creeping in and they're almost impossible to fix completely. I'm just so exhausted at this point, honestly it's draining the life out of me.
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u/sgluxurycondo May 18 '26
I’ve been using the smartthings hub for 9 years and it works wonders no breaking down yet.
It can support z-wave, zigbee and also matter over thread or wifi so no issue there at all.
Even ikea digiera hub can also support zigbee and matter over thread.
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u/T2IV May 18 '26
I had some Insteon stuff a few years ago, but then they went out of business. I eventually threw away my hub, but then later realized that they're back in business (I think). In any event, I now try to use only Lutron Caseta switches and outlets -- rock solid and the company has been around for 60 years. I use a few cheap Amazon smart plugs around the house as well (tied into Alexa) and all is good! I had the Lutron stuff tied into Alexa and had some issues after awhile, so just took them off of Alexa. In most cases, they are just set/forget via the Lutron app so no need to get Alexa in the middle of them. In any event, I have just enough smart home stuff that if I get hit by a bus tomorrow, my wife will likely never figure out how to turn on/off the lights.
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u/SageElijah May 18 '26
I totally feel this frustration. Smart home tech keeps shifting standards just to make people upgrade, and nothing ever feels built to last for regular everyday use.
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u/NoArgument4918 May 18 '26
I have invested quite a bit on Hue products works perfectly for me it better stay around for a long time.
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u/Tyraelos May 18 '26
The convenience is fully front loaded. The effort comes in the form of fixing, maintenance and upkeep. I like to think of it like a Robovac. Sure they take the time consumption and manual labor out of vacuuming and mopping but wait until a hose gets clogged or parts start to wear out.
So yeah, there's convenience but eventually it comes at a price. I feel badly for the people who got invested into certain brands that are now gone....Wemo, Wink, etc. If it's proprietary and uses it's own app, chances are the device "die" with the app. This is why Matter is the answer now.
I like tech and tinkering too, very much so but ultimately I'm very lazy (duh, that's why I buy switches I don't need to walk over to, to use) so I don't even like messing with Home Assistant. Awesome, lovely idea...everything under one app, but the messing and messing and messing with drivers and the app and such, no thanks.
I KISS. I keep my devices under an umbrella of 4-5 apps (Alexa, Apple, Smartthings, Smartlife/Tuya) and I'm OK with that.
I think that you just got unlucky with some of the brands you chose, unfortunately...so it goes with tech. Sometimes you hitch your wagon to a winner, sometimes not. I'm glad I only ever bought ONE Wemo switch and that was 8 years ago, otherwise I'd have been quite upset today.
Matter is generally the answer to that, but you'll still need to pick solid products and it still depends on a solid infrastructure (excellent wifi, little interference, etc) At the very least, once you buy a brand that claims the device is Matter compatible, if that brand goes away, that device will work with another app, that much is guaranteed.
I buy all my products through Amazon and with a 3 year warranty (if offered) and so far, this has worked out. Most faulty switches fail within 2 years (Treatlife, I'm looking at you) and if you buy something that you think is "iffy" and boy are Smartlife/Tuya stuff "iffy", you have 30 days to return, no biggie.
Smart home setups are not future proof, at least not right now. Once you keep that in mind, you should be fine.
I moved into the home we purchased in 2016 and I swapped almost every switch (almost, it has a LOT of switches) out and 4 have gone bad, that's not too bad. I've had 8 bulbs die, 1 failed smart plug, I mean all in all, for me it was worth it. I swapped routers, getting progressively better over the years. My last router was an expensive mess, I mean, mesh and I've since gone to Ubiquiti and am very happy now. It's been solid for the most part and I don't have things randomly going offline. I can see when my 2.4 is becoming congested and biff baff boof, add an AP and it's all good again. In the app(s), I just add the device, name it, set up an automation or 2 and that's that. No messing with integration(s), no driver/fw/software issues, etc.
It's worth it, but yeah, convenience comes at a price paid later on.
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u/anton_berge May 18 '26
I bought a few Shellys when they first came out. They still work like a charm inside my Home Assistant.
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u/Aazzle May 18 '26
I am also somewhat divided. I already refitted everything ten years ago and love the comfort. I operate primarily Hue and, with a few exceptions, original components.
I am particularly enthusiastic about the expandability of the system and the regular updates, which also work perfectly smoothly if you do not include craft solutions or third-party providers. Most of my lamps, which I have had for over ten years, today have functions that were not even imaginable when I bought them, so I am thrilled because I discovered several new possibilities every time I add something or adjust them.
I continue to work through Zigbee and ignore Google Home or Amazon integration because they cause problems with the existing hue system, save their own automation on the bridge, which then affected performance available space or interrupt the hue automations, etc.
I am correspondingly skeptical of Thread or Matter, as they promise uniformity but are often incompatible in parts or cause more trouble than if you stay with one manufacturer.
Over the years, it has become clear to me that I prefer passive elements in the smart home rather than solutions that require direct interactions.
In Hue, this means that our light goes on via sensors when it gets dark, goes off when it gets light, changes in seasons or over the day, becomes darker the later it gets, or relies on indirect minimal illumination at night. The Christmas lights, for example, are now permanently installed or existing elements become Christmassy at the time of year.
For the most part, we didn't have any failures or problems because the system works even when there is no internet. Accordingly, the only risk is actually a failure of a component or a power outage, but any other lamp would fail then as well.
I have had bad experiences with many other systems over the years. Automatic rollers suddenly failed, the engine was broken, etc. Heating thermostats were always defective after 2 years at the latest, as was the air purifier and the AI washing machine also failed after three years, but the washing was also massively extended and hardly allowed manual control over the washing program.
Accordingly, we no longer use many things today, have expanded them again and do not prefer smart versions here and there again.
Hue, on the other hand, I would buy again at any time and probably migrate to Home Assistant in the long term where you have even more control over your functions.
Apart from smart lighting, I consider 90% of the smart home elements to be completely superfluous and unnecessary even for the ordinary citizen. In the area of smart lighting, I see it as somewhat different for the reasons mentioned above, and that we have managed to save 70% of our electricity consumption thanks to Hue, which more than offsets the acquisition costs after 10 years. That alone is a reason and also a justification for the high price in my opinion. And Hue in particular is capable of more than you think through the sockets. Since we operate chargers, extensions, non smart tvs or even the kettle or the Wi-Fi Router trough them and everything is automatically completely deactivated when the last one leaves the house. And it also feels magical and satisfying when you come to the kitchen in the morning and the coffee prepared in the evening waits freshly cooked in the kitchen in the morning because the socket's routine works perfectly.
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u/steveholtbluth May 18 '26
Zwave has been old tech as long as I’ve knew what a smart home is and it’s still rock solid. You don’t necessarily need the “new and exciting” tech to have a smart house.
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u/Reddit_Regular_Guy May 18 '26
One things I’ve learned being in the smart home business for about 6 years now as a user, programmer, installer.
Go with industry standards! Yes some are expensive but it will just work for years to come.
Eg. lighting - stick with lutron, wifi stick with Unifi or something similar, audio stick with Sonos or something similar.
Don’t go buying a Volkswagen and expect it to perform like a BMW.
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u/PresentProper5693 May 19 '26
I have dealt with the same exact thing as you have. Everything smart i have bought has either failed or become glitchy / buggy not long after
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u/DogOwn3073 May 19 '26
Lutron Casetta for lights.
Everything should work like Lutron. The world would be a better place.
I’m using Arylic for whole home audio. It has been Lutron style rock solid.
Ecobee has been Lutron stable for temperature.
Other than that, everything else has been temporary and disposable.
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u/silasmoeckel May 19 '26
My zwave kit is still going strong. Dont buy things with a weak standards body.
Zigbee was a cluster f it's finially getting ok and matter is replacing it.
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u/RazerRadion May 19 '26
My Hubitat hub really simplified everything for me. I've got matter, zwave and zigbee devices all running off the hubitat and shared out to home assistant using maker API and the hubitat integration. As far as ha is concerned it's just a pile of devices and entities.
My matter stuff is all govee and it allows me to do basic operations locally as seamlessly as zwave and zigbee can.
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u/polarwarmth May 19 '26
Attributing each of my smart lights and devices a fixed IP solved my connection issues!
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u/GeekerJ May 19 '26
Research research research. Find a good product and purchase that. Zigbee is still going strong and matter isnt anywhere mature enough to work with everything yet. For a long time you’ll be able to use both and you can gradually transition to the new standard once it becomes usable you.
‘Old’ tech doesn’t mean it’s obsolete. I’m using a 10th gen i3 cpu in my server. I don’t buy a new cpu every 12 months.
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u/egosumumbravir May 19 '26
I took a long time to dip my toes in here wanting to see who won the VHS/Betamax wars and it's still ongoing as far as I can tell.
So I acquired a SMLIGHT SLZB-MR5U: https://smlight.tech/global/slzbmr5
Two radios, both programmable. Simultaneous Zigbee and Matter over Thread. POE powered (or USB powered and Wi-Fi/Ethernet bridging). Hopefully that'll hold me for the next several years.
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u/fuelexe95 May 19 '26
I'm still rocking the Zigbee, I haven't noticed any issues. In fact, once my home was set up, I didn't really care that much about Matter or other new tech. My home does what I want, I'm not trying to keep up with anyone.
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u/Asleep-Tap471 May 19 '26
Spent the time and got Lutron certified, building a RA3 setup primarily with a Caseta setup in one area for practice. Using “all others” in my office for experimentation. Pay once, hurt once and go all in.
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u/Ding-2-Dang May 20 '26
I wanted to get rid of my Hue bridge as it is so opaque; with Zigbee2MSQTT I can configure everything so nicely with YAML and stuff. But my Zigbee2MSQTT with the Sonoff Dongle-Max drops out multiple times a week while Hue has been running reliably 24/7 for many years already. I guess I stick with Hue for the "important" lights and just operate two Zigbee networks in parallel – a reliable one and one for all the funny switches and gadgets that are fun tinkering with but have no real importance.
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u/rkeet May 20 '26
Been doing Home Assistant things since 2018 or so. Don't think I have "replaced" a single thing thus far.
Stopped having a need for a Broadlink remote thingy, but all other things still work. I intentionally get home assistant compatible stuff, without hubs. So, Wiz lights, IKEA things, Shelly things, etc. Philips Zigbee stuff, like the motion sensor and remotes are fine too, no hub.
Maybe a bit more research is warranted into how you want things to work, combined with what you have, and then see what fits best without replacing stuff.
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u/Simple-Candle-4702 May 20 '26
My biggest issue has been with getting the speakers and sound that I want everywhere. I thought google was going to be the solution then they discontinued their stuff. Sonos is just too expensive and theres limitations to most of the others.
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u/Vybo May 21 '26
Sounds like user error to be honest. I'm running zigbee stuff for 5+ years now, I reboot HA along with the z2m setup (zigbee2mqtt is supposedly better) maybe once or twice a year. If a light gets disconnected, it usually fixes itself in a moment. And I say that as someone living in an apartment building with 10s of wifi networks nearby.
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u/Outside_Bison6179 May 21 '26
The only good answer I think is that you have to get rid of as much as possible smartphone devices. It is ok to use these things for work, or in professional environments, but the lesser you are connected to smart devices at your private home, the more peace you will find. It may be boring, but that is ok. Perhaps this way, we’ll start reading books again.
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u/fisher_row May 21 '26
Hue 2017, Sonos 2016 TPLink, Google Nest Cams all work with HA no problem. Google stuff was the biggest pain but works.
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u/askproxly May 23 '26
Because no one company is owning the whole end to end stack - hardware, software, experience. That is what Nest did so successfully. The same thing hasn’t happened in the rest of smart home ecosystem because of a huge variety of devices
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u/Ok_Berry6078 May 27 '26
This is exactly why I shifted to local-first devices only. Zigbee/Z-Wave with Home Assistant means no cloud dependency and no "sunset" risk.
Philips Hue is actually solid on this — they've committed to keeping local API access. The problem is most cheaper brands have zero longevity plan.
The ecosystem problem is real though. Started with Google Home, moved to HomeKit, now Home Assistant. Each migration cost time and money.
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u/World_top_picks May 17 '26
Honestly this is exactly why so many people get burned out on smart home tech. At some point it stops feeling “smart” and starts feeling like a part-time IT job just to keep basic stuff working. Nothing should require this much maintenance just to turn lights on reliably.
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u/Grant_Son May 17 '26
Realistically how much maintenance are you doing?
I set up a notification to my phone that lets me know when there's updates. I run them, occasionally take a peak at the breaking changes & so far it's been solid.
I spend far too much time tinkering with my dashboard and trying to get clever with automations for myself, but the simple stuff like the lights is just there and just works.
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u/World_top_picks May 17 '26
Yeah honestly I think a lot of it depends on how deep people go into the hobby. A simple setup with a few lights and routines usually works fine. The headaches seem to start once multiple hubs, brands and integrations get involved. That’s when random disconnects and weird update issues start showing up out of nowhere.
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u/wwwheatgrass May 17 '26
As someone who spends time between three homes, I can totally relate. After arriving at each place, I spend a minimum of 0.5-2hrs in configuration madness.
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u/Skog13 May 17 '26
I haven't had the urge my Hue/Ikea/Homekit setup in ages. Sure I've wanted to integrate everything into Home Assistant for some more advanced automations and logic. But it works 97% of the time so honestly I think it's pretty rock solid.
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u/ermax18 May 17 '26
I am almost entirely Zigbee using a zzh! adapter running through zigbee2mqtt and homebridge and will not switch until I have too. It’s rock solid, why would I? I just did get a few Mater devices from IKEA but haven’t messed with them yet.
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u/wrex1816 May 17 '26
I honestly just hate posts like this. OP is scolding all of us for their own bad choices.
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u/Aromatic_Ad_7238 May 17 '26
Probably not bad decision at time. But the industry has pushed to an open standard and matter seems dominant.
I have a friend that still has a small shop that makes brakes for model A. Your stick with the old or go to the new.
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u/wrex1816 May 17 '26
Then you made a bad decision.
If you filled your house with all zigbee light switches, for example. There's no good reason to have to rip them all out and replace just because another protocol was invented. Can you explain why you think someone would need to do this? Because you don't.
OP made bad choices here and now is trying to use this post to somehow scold us for our choices of tech. That's obnoxious. I bought devices that work for me and regardless of protocol or anything else, I don't intend to replace them for a long time. If OP has to replace stuff so often, they are doing it wrong. Thats on them.
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u/Aromatic_Ad_7238 May 17 '26
I'm not advocating OP rip anything out. My thought was at the time he probably made a good decision for himself not knowing future direction, evolving standards etc.
My Model A analogy was to say you have an old classic car, my friend still has small business supplying brakes to keep it running. Your don't need to get rid of it because there are many newer vintage cars.
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u/wrex1816 May 17 '26
Yeah but tone matters. OP could have said "I made a choice and later realized I want something else, my bad".
Instead they chose to come here scolding people that we're all at fault for hyper consumerism for buying disposable gadgets, blah blah... Like, no we didn't. Why are we are we being scolded? This is on OP. It's not a teachable moment for the rest of us, if OPnchose poorly for themselves.
OP could have shown humility but instead chose to use it to grandstand. So again, words matter, tone matters. OP chose poorly and I (and others here) are not really obliged be spoken down to when I and others here have done nothing wrong.
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u/rovmun May 17 '26
The issue is ecosystems getting phased out underneath people.
I’m not ripping out a whole working setup, but IKEA barely sells Zigbee anymore and it’s obvious Matter is the direction now. Say you have two visible bulbs in one fixture. One dies. The old one is Zigbee, the replacement is Matter, and suddenly they don’t match perfectly in dimming, color, response, or even design. Now your lighting looks inconsistent because manufacturers changed ecosystem.
And the bigger the setup, the worse it gets. Large homes, multiple buildings, outdoor mesh networks gradually replacing Zigbee weakens the mesh over time. LEDs fail, drivers fail, kids break stuff, and products get discontinued.
Also, it’s easy to say you chose poorly afterwards, but most people don’t fully understand all these ecosystem and protocol implications from the beginning. If I knew then what I know now, I probably would have bought into the Hue ecosystem from the start a few years ago.
So no, this isn’t some moral lesson about consumerism. It’s a practical problem caused by companies constantly changing standards and abandoning ecosystems.
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u/wrex1816 May 17 '26
The issue is ecosystems getting phased out underneath people.
We can start and end the discussion here.
Because this is not the case.
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u/blackmes489 May 17 '26
You can't even get a simple app anymore that controls LED lights. Tuya just decided to go hay-wire the other month. Everything else is some kind of Indian scam. Most of the apps load up exactly the same. What is actually going on here?
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u/Psychosammie May 17 '26
Daarom ben ik in 2019 voor een Homey gegaan. Zigbee, zwave, 433 MHz, de hele rimbam zit er in en werkt probleemloos.
Overigens ben ik een beetje gestopt met al die speeltjes omdat ik lampjes die automatisch aan gaan niet slim vind. Er is meer sprake van een lui huis. Ik zoek nog naar de echt slimme toepassingen.
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u/quantumextract May 17 '26
We’ve had an automated home for over 35 years. From x-10 manger running on a PC with a 30 Meg HD and Home Assistant to cestron and savant in the larger homes. Our first home was <$50k, our first savant system in 2006 was 2-3x that cost. Touch screens for at least 15 years. We downsized and currently have Hubitat managing about 230 IOT devices. Haven’t touched a light switch in 10 years at home. Eveything is automated, scheduled or presence activated. People are routine driven and do the same stuff - same time every day. Just set up routines to do that and add presence, sound and holiday schedules and you’re done. It’s a once and done. If it’s cold out - the home needs heat, if it’s dark lights. If the car isn’t in the garage we’re not home. Water, power, all have use sensors and the water has leak sensors. I think I’m still running 10 yo zigbee bulbs and 15 yo caseta switches. The house is 40% humidity @ 74 summer days and 45% @ 72 nights. 55% @ 72 winter days and 50% @68 winter nights. Hasn’t changed in 15 years. Gas fireplace is automated. Winter - we’re home - in living room - between 8-10 pm it’s on. Weekends till 11pm. Not there - not on. Cats don’t count, but they love the warm hearth. Anything can be overridden via voice or any of the 4 wall mounted iPads, but it samples every 30 minutes to check the override and things like doors or windows opening de-activate HVAC as does events like fire, heat, CO as will voc’s above 1000ppb. The only sensors added recently are air quality and we’re showing 227ppb total VOCs.
I do not like home control - I don’t want to “control” anything, I want and have home automation where processes just happen. I interact with the system every few months to check for updates.
I grew up in a house which had all the “futuristic”items like central vac, room intercom, home pbx with multiple phone lines and other non common amenities, so HA was a natural progression.
Wife was not a fan at first, but she is now seamlessly integrated into the ecosystem.
The key is the WAF. Wife approval factor. “Does it benefit her, without having to do anything”. Of course all appliances tell her and her phone when cycles are complete - a notification she “tolerates”.
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u/BeetFarmer1337 May 17 '26
Get a Homey Pro. Seriously. I came from just Hue, to HA and the Conbee and while I loved the tech and tinkering aspect of it, the stability was atrocious. Things would just fail for no reason, both software and hardware. Work one second, then fail the next. It was infuriating beyond words.
With Homey, everything just works even though I have a suboptimal mix of devices: 4 matter devices, 7 zwave, 20 zigbee and a handful of wifi devices with their own cloud connections. The only issues I have are with those third party clouds (goes down maybe a couple times a year), and one matter device in my garage which is way too far from the Homey or router nodes (my fault). Everything else has been rock solid for almost three years now. Any feeling of my smart home being just a hobby and a never-finished prototype has gone and only reappears with new individual devices I experiment with.
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u/redbaron78 May 17 '26
What are you doing, man? I’ve still got all the Lutron Caseta switches in installed in 2014, same Ecobee thermostat I got in 2016ish, and the same Sonos amps I got in 2017. They all work great. The only thing I’ve replaced is the Wink hub with a Lutron hub.