Zigbee Crash Course

[Ron L]

Long time user of Tasmota with "many" devices in my Home Automation network consisting of Raspberry Pi running Node-Red and local MQTT Broker.  My tablets/phones are running HomeRemote with a MQTT plugin.  Currently, all Tasmota IOT devices are 2.4ghz WiFi and are performing fine.  That said, how difficult would it be to move the majority of the devices to Zigbee?  If I understand correctly, this would take them OFF of my wifi network which is what my overall goal would be.

I compile my own versions of Tasmota from the source code with VS Code.  I assume Zigbee devices can still be configured with DS18B20 temperature sensors.

If I wanted to experiment, what type of "zigbee hub" setup would be recommended for my setup?  (I am not interested in Home Assistant at this time)

If the Tasmota device is connected via Zigbee (and not wifi); is there still a Web User Interface one can access for FW updates, config changes, etc?

Sound doable?

[Andrew Russell]

Going Zigbee is a different approach.

You buy off the shelf Zigbee devices (temperature sensors, light bulbs, etc) and control them via a gateway like Zigbee2Mqtt or Tasmota/Zigbee.

Zigbee devices use a standard protocol, so you don't need to re-flash them.

And you need a Zigbee gateway, which is Zigbee2Mqtt or Tasmota/Zigbee.

This all gets really simple if you use Home Assistant with plugins Mosquitto and Zigbee2Mqtt (and I recommend the SMLight Ethernet to Zigbee gateway).

In my set up, I use...

• Tasmota for anything custom, like DS18B20s, pulse counters and RF gateways.
• WiFi (either Shelly with Shelly firmware, or Sonoff with Tasmota firmware) for anything that is difficult to access. I have a phobia about needing to re-pair all my Zigbee devices, and that would be difficult if they are behind switch-plates in the wall.
• Zigbee for smart lights, temperature sensors, leak sensors, buttons (basically, anything that is best battery powered).

Hope that helps

Andrew

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[Ron L]

Thanks for the summary Andrew.  But I guess I do not understand what the Zigbee section in Tasmota FW is for or when you would enable/utilize it?  It is currently all disabled in my FW builds.

Regardless, sounds like I need to just leave my setup alone.

Thanks again

[Justin Adie]

It is for using a tasmotised advice as a controller / bridge for ZigBee devices. 

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[Philip Knowles]

The ZigBee section is for Tasmotising things like the Sonoff ZigBee Bridge. The Bridge will then act as a cut down ZigBee2MQTT

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From: sonof...@googlegroups.com <sonof...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Ron L <rgl...@gmail.com>
Sent: 16 November 2025 14:27
To: TasmotaUsers <sonof...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Zigbee Crash Course

 

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[reimb...@gmail.com]

>>> sounds like I need to just leave my setup alone.

I agree. You cannot do with Zigbee what you can do with ESP's and Tasmota.

I use Zigbee mainly for dimming lights and strips. IMHO that's a pain in Tasmota and not wife compatible. 

Additionally some door and window sensors. A tasmotized Sonoff Bridge converts their changing state into MQTT messages. 

[Philip Knowles]

I've converted a lot of my devices to ZigBee and BLE. Many routers only allow 32 wifi items (and wifi operates at the speed of the slowest device) - I try to limit only IoT things to the 2.4GHz band everything else is on 5GHz. Things like switches (without power monitoring) just 'sit there' 90% of the time so most of them I have replaced with ZigBee (and my dimmers too). ZigBee has a lot better range so my garage and shed are reachable with ZigBee but not wifi. I tend to use ZigBee PIRs - there are some very good battery 'scene' switches which are really useful too. I've tried wifi, BLE and ZigBee temp/humidity sensors but none seem to have the claimed battery life (or accuracy) so I have ended up using Ruuvi (expensive but reliable).

I run openHAB (with Google Assistant), ZigBee2MQTT and Node-Red on a Wyse thin client.  

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Sent: Monday, November 17, 2025 08:37

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