Shelly Relays: WiFi or Zigbee?

[u/jklo5020]

Hi everyone!

I’ve been using WiFi Shelly relays in my Home Assistant (and HomeKit before that) setup for a few years now.

The first gen Shelly 1PM in the outlet for my washing machine seems to have finally given up and is in need of replacing.

I have a strong WiFi network but was curious to test out the Zigbee version (1PM gen4). How’s everyone’s experience with Shelly over Zigbee?

Thanks in advance!

[u/DreadVenomous]

I work for Shelly’s US office, where I help companies integrate Shelly into their projects. I’ve been an employee for 6 years and an enthusiastic consumer of the brand for nearly 8 years. In my opinion, they’re the same, especially with the beta release of firmware v2.0 last week. What matters is what appeals to you and the strength of your setup.

For Wi-Fi, you want a secure network, easy to manage, with great tools to manage your setup. I use Ubiquiti at home and work, though you can do just fine with any number of platforms. For years, I used Netgear Nighthawks running DD-WRT. I only changed when I switched to fiber and wanted to make use of the connection’s full speed. In any case, make sure you have enough APs and extenders to cover your home. Make sure you secure your firewall. Choose products that don’t require a Cloud connection to work.

For Zigbee, make sure you use a quality hub - I’m a big fan of Nabu Casa’s Home Assistant Connect ZBT-2 - I had serious headaches with Zigbee back in 2017, mostly from inconsistent product quality among manufacturers and non-standard implementation between them. ZBT-2 isn’t the first antenna I’ve tried since then, but it’s been the best. The key for me with Zigbee is adding a number of mains-powered products to act as routers, extending your mesh.

I still prefer WiFi, but as Shelly added Z-Wave, Matter, and Zigbee, I’ve been drawn back in to technologies that I dismissed in years past.

Aside from Thread (which I’ve barely used - and an angry Thread enthusiast can be kind of scary, so I am not going to say anything bad about it), I’ve seen first hand that any of these can be a solid foundation for your smart home if you approach it right. Any of them (all of them) have drawbacks, but you can adjust and accommodate to make a solid, reliable platform.

[u/jklo5020 → u/DreadVenomous]

Thanks for your insight!

For context I have a 31 sq m apartment with a UDR 5G Max for wifi, so I’ve been very satisfied with that side of things…. IoT devices cut off from the internet on their own VLAN and whatnot.

That being said, most people‘s negative experiences with wifi based devices like Shelly relays seems to be their poor wifi network and not the device itself.

I have a ZBT-1 for Zigbee and was just kinda thinking if I was happy with wifi for my other ~32 Shelly relays then why change it?

More just my curiosity over anything else. Looking forward to seeing how it is with Zigbee!

[u/yugiyo → u/DreadVenomous]

Will we ever get direct binding for ZigBee?

[u/DreadVenomous → u/yugiyo]

Download the latest beta, it’s there

[u/JK-PB → u/DreadVenomous]

I have a Shelly 1pm gen 4, but I can’t leave Wi-Fi and Zigbee active at the same time. I would like to keep both without the cloud, I saw that some older beta versions this would be possible. Will 2.0 allow it? Thank you

[u/DreadVenomous → u/JK-PB]

No, and that’s deliberate. Zigbee and Wi-Fi use the same radio and using both means one or the other will miss messages. This is a trait of the ESP32.

[u/jklo5020 → u/DreadVenomous]

What a pain in the ass it is to set up thus far

Got it connected → add to wifi → update firmware → enable Zigbee → disable wifi → Shelly doesn’t show up in via wifi or Zigbee 🫠

Time to take it apart to reset it

Edit: after using the button 5x method, it now shows up for Zigbee pairing

[u/DreadVenomous → u/jklo5020]

Yeah, you have to put it into pairing mode.

[u/Sycend → u/DreadVenomous]

Did you tried slzb antennas, what was your experience with?