Everything I Purchased for Home Assistant Last Month
Too many awesome Matter + Thread devices and they're affordable!
In the coming weeks I’ll be posting a lot about home assistant and how great it is. From combining my pool heat pump with an old pump system, and controlling them in home assistant by reverse engineering, to setting up an open thread border router for low power IoT devices….
To doing facial recognition faster than any enterprise camera system on the market.
That’s one of my favorites by the way, I have Home Assistant speak over my speakers “Someone is at the door” and “A package has arrived.”
It’s so fast, this plays before people press my doorbell and catches delivery drivers who barely step onto the porch before leaving.
I’ll get into that more later, but for now here’s just a fun list of all the devices I’ve bought with a brief review / description of them. Also note that I do get a small commission if you purchase through the links I share.
Also, I actually bought all of these 🤣
Wireless Human Presence Sensor LWR01, mmWave Radar
These devices are really cool. Using mmwave, same type of stuff in the iPhone’s UWB chip, these let you detect if people are present, even if they aren’t moving. Aqara has a version of this that is way more sophisticated but can’t be bought yet, where you can tell if people sit or stand, and make zones from one sensor.
The goal with these is to have lights come on, tv turn on, and turn off as you walk away if nobody is in a room. Right now I have one of these turn on two shower fans automatically and stay running until a period after leaving. The fans turn on thanks to the next product:
Matter over Thread Smart Switch
I really like these, since they are using Thread. As long as your wire boxes behind your switch have neutral wires (some old homes do not) these will work perfectly. They have no issue connecting over thread and have been great so far. Can’t complain when it’s under $30. I want to replace every single switch I have with them!
BroadLink RM4 pro IR and RF Universal Remote
I let my wife buy 3 fans that do NOT work well with the wall switch. They all have remotes that we sometimes lose, and without the remotes you cannot control them. Thanks to this device, I can train and control 433mhz fans, and now all of them are in home assistant and can be controlled via voice or via the HA app. Works great after blocking its internet access too.
TP-Link Tapo Smart Light Bulbs, Matter-Certified
These were the most affordable, Matter supported light bulbs I could find. They do not support thread unfortunately… but they are only $10 each, which is way more affordable than Philips Hue. I got these to see how they compare. They work great for controlling through home assistant or anything that supports Matter (like Apple Homekit). The problem is, there isn’t group support in Matter yet (for lights), at least not fully implemented.
It doesn’t work well if you want to control more than 2-3 at a time. It seems the spec is working on this support. I won’t be buying more until I can group them and send group broadcast commands. Otherwise the matter spec seems very good.
SONOFF Matter Smart Plug S41s 4-Pack
Another Matter enabled device, this time smart switches. I love the Matter spec as I can quickly add these items to home assistant and block their internet access. I would prefer a thread version of these and light bulbs, but those are harder to find. Thread is great because it’s a mesh and can work with apple homekit, a custom border router, and all of it can work through home assistant together as one mesh. It operates in between the main 2.4ghz wifi bands too.
Waveshare 6-Channel ESP32-S3
This thing is a BEAST for under $40. If you have any desire to make a smart garage door by controlling your existing one over wifi, or in my case, you want to connect the A and B slots in the top left to interface with a Pentair pool system, you can’t beat this. The ESP32 hardware has an awesome way to develop firmware called esphome.
Having claude or codex configure different actions is a breeze. For example, I configured the CH1 relay to connect the relay for 100ms when i press a button in home assistant, to open my garage door. I also have another one that communicates and controls my pool equipment, the official manufacture wants 600-1000 for this same functionality that is even worse and cloud based.
SONOFF Zigbee 3.0 & Thread Dongle Lite
This is a great thread border router antenna. The company behind it has a website where you can flash the firmware for zigbee or thread to it. After that, I told claude “use the connected thread dongle and start open thread border router’s official docker container and validate it all works”
It was that simple to get it going. I then went to my iPhone and uploaded the existing Apple Homekit border router’s credentials in Home Assistant, and had claude (with the power of ha-mcp) update my border router to join that same network so it all works together. I have this one on one side of the house and already had an apple tv acting as a border router on the other side.
Waveshare Industrial ESP32-S3
Same idea as above for CAN or RS485 communication, but way smaller. If you have good wifi coverage this can be a better option if you don’t need the relays.
Aqara Door and Window Sensor P2, Matter Over Thread
FINALLY another thread device. This thing works great and is extra low power thanks to thread. The battery has been chilling at 3v and 100% battery according to home assistant, but I’ve only had this one a bit over a week. One thing I want to debug for fun if I get the time, is if this battery lasts way longer with another border router a bit closer to it. What’s so cool about thread is each device can piggy back off the other, unless if it is an “end” device such as this one, which wont forward along nearby device data.
3Pack ESP32 ESP-32S
The main esp32 board only, with headers for easy connections. Useful extras that I keep in case I need to automate something.
3pcs Relay Module
If you want to do similar relay logic like the waveshare earlier, these are great options to use the main esp32 board in a smaller package with a single manual relay attachment.
60W Adjustable Temperature Soldering Iron Kit
I almost fried my pool controller mainboard, so I picked up a soldering iron as the board is actually quite repairable. Luckily it ended up being okay, but I have this just in case anyway. There are times you don’t have nice screw terminals or headers where it can be useful.
Linkind Matter Smart Bulbs
Four for $40, about the same cost as the other bulbs but in the e12 format I needed. All the same stuff I said before, works great on Matter, but group control sucks without using the manufacturer apps.
Summary
That was a A TON of stuff. If I started everything fresh in my house, I would buy purely Matter over Thread products and esphome / esp32 devices. These interface with Home Assistant and other smart homes and do not need internet access. Hope you enjoyed the list and found some interesting smart home ideas!