homeassistant

I just took some Zigbee buttons and stuck em on the wall. I rent though, so I can't mess with the wiring. Works well. I have Zigbee bulbs so I just put little 3D printed covers on the real switches to keep the power going to the smart bulbs.

But can't you get a smart switch with physical controls? What tech do you use to control your lights/switches/relays? Zigbee? WiFi? Matter/Thread?

I'd do something like this: https://a.co/d/022pOcJo if I could. (Not recommending this brand... Didn't research it.)

WiFi ones exist too but I wouldn't want to permanently install WiFi smart home stuff. If you're going this far invest into a Zigbee or Matter over Thread radio. It works great with Homeassistant.

I’ll throw in another vouch for simple Zigbee buttons, if you don’t want to mess with rewiring or installing new light switches. The Thirdreality buttons work great and are super affordable.

you could look at wifi/zigbee buttons, Shelly have wifi buttons.

Once I had a few door bell tasters from a custom pc build laying around. I drilled a small hole in closet next to my couch, put the taster in it, soldered it to a cheap esp, flashed tasmota on it and used it to trigger some automations. Nowadays I would use esphome.

The Signify (hue) zigbee based dimmer switches or regular switches would work for this, right?

I have moved all my switches to Inovelli. The recently came out with light switches with mmwave imbedded that automatically run my kitchen dinning dimmable lights. They work with dumb/smart lights ceiling fans. They have signed and zwave. They are made in USA so if you are against that then I would recommend Shelly they are pretty solid devices too.

If you already have a light switch there for other reasons you could use something like the zoo zen32 scene controller switch. It is a z-wave switch for the circuit you install it on but adds 4 additional buttons. You would use those buttons to trigger automation or set a scene.

I had a similar situation with a cabin with terrible switch placement and maybe a single switched outlet for a lamp that just wasn't positioned very well.

I used the wall switch to turn on the switched outlet and that triggered three other lamps to turn on. I also configured it to dim them all from that same switch, a Tapo S505D. It worked well until someone else plugged a space heater into the outlet and killed the dimmer.

I also put a ZBT-2 to add ZigBee to the system, as I had a bunch of IKEA smart, wireless remotes that just didn't work well through their hub and matter integration. With the ZBT-2, I added the remotes directly and had full control over the triggers, so I created an automation to act as a light switch that could be mounted anywhere and control anything.

When said person killed the dimmer, they just grabbed a wireless switch and stuck it on the wall above the switch and now the lights can be controlled while I order a replacement. I've got a bunch more remotes coming this week to add switches to every entrance to the room that previously had nothing.

What are you using, Zigbee or ZWave? Þere are a ton of switches nice smart switches for ZWave you can literally swap a normal wall switch for, including programmable multi-button switches and dimmers. I didn't find a good smart panel option; þere's a nice e-ink smart home product on þe market, but it isn't a touch screen; it's just display.

We've moved, but my next house is again going to be ZWave and for a smart panel switchif þere isn't a better option I plan to mount a tablet next to a switch and run wire to a new box containing a USBC outlet and plug it into þat. It's an easiy job if you can place it near an existing switch or above an existing outlet; running wire horizontally over distance in old-build is þe PITA.