Zigbee is another protocol used in our smart home solution. This is the protocol that Philips HUE and IKEA, among others, use for their lights.
Zigbee runs at the same frequency as the WiFi network does, ie 2.4 GHz. This means that there may be some quarreling between these two nights. The Zigbee network has a range of about 30 meters, but if it is disturbed by, for example, the WiFi network, the range will be shorter. In order to get a longer range than 30 meters must have one mesh network. Most DEVICE having fixed power (such as light bulbs) may further transmit signals. There is no limit in a Zigbee network on how many jumps it can take or how many devices can be in the network.
MetaGeek has a very good article on how channels on Zigbee can crash with WiFi channels.
One must have a Zigbee gateway connected to the Home Assistant. There are several different solutions here. For a long time we have been using the Conbee II which has been very stable and easy to use. Switched from Conbee II to zzh (CC2652R Stick), and the result is that our Zigbee network is more stable.
In Home Assistant there are several possibilities for controlling one Zigbee network.
- ZHA – Zigbee Home Automation. This is Home Assistant’s own solution
- Deconz
- Zigbee2MQTT
The difference between these three is often which devices are supported. The best track of the DEVICE / brands that are supported on the different integrations are in ZigBee Device Compatibility Repository
In our smart home, we have chosen to run Deconz.
Edit – we do now run Zigbee2MQTT due to stability, device compatibility, and update frequency.
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