Homey Pro 2023 and Homey Bridge Satelite mode

Can’t control what?

Did you place the Bridge between your Homey Pro and the second floor?

How many Zigbee router devices do you have already? See Homey Developer Tools to find out.

Add more Zigbee router devices, a single Homey Bridge is not enough, and it’s also a very expensive device if you just want to extend your Zigbee network.

I’m afraid you expected the bridge as satellite to be able to extend/bridge the zigbee network(s) by LAN? Isn’t it?
The current functionality is: ‘just another zigbee router / hop’ , like Robert already pointed out.

But, maybe, one day, somewhere in time…:

yes cause this is what i used to do with the Aqara hubs ! I ditched Aqara hubs for Homey pro to manage all my house with homey Pro and Satellite bridge … now i can only control the ground floor and not the first floor yet lower level of features from each switch like the long press and double press on the sensors that do not show as options under homey
no need to mention the challenges i face to add a new device !! homey app is amazing and still have lots of nice features but until this extension thing is fixed unfortunately i will have to revert back to Aqara hubs as my first floor became completely disconnected now

Hmmm, I’m afraid you probably don’t understand yet what Robert meant by this:

When you add a powered zigbee devices somewhere in between the ground floor and first floor, or at both ends of the stairs for instance, just fiddle and test a bit how far apart you can place the routers.
Upstairs, you can extend the mesh network with (an)other powered zigbee device(s) again.
But not endlessly, there is a limit to how many hops (routers) a zigbee device can use. I think you’ll notice when a far (from Homey) away zigbee device acts on and off, unreliable.

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I have to say my zigbee devices upstairs just paired w/o issues via existing zigbee routers to Homey downstairs; maybe your wifi is interfering your zigbee channel.

hi Robert, I have around 40 to 50 Zigbee devices between light switches, Motion sensors and door sensors.
my homey Pro is in the ground floor just very close to the stairs ( nearest place i can get power plug)
while my Homey bridge is right above it again nearest place i can get power. I have the stairs light switch ( powered router ) right on the ground floor and the other stairs light switch ( powered ) on the second floor. normally that should be enough right ?

is there any indication that shows my homey bridge is well receiving the Zigbee signal or not … may be i can move it to a different place ! also when i try to pair Aqara devices the options are not well categorize under the right device type so i have to try multiple devices many times ( sometimes doesn’t connect at all saying the device is already paired ( I discovered this is actually a misleading message that means the device is not the right model so wheni keep trying many models it can finally pair )

That doesn’t say much. If you have 40 sensors and 10 (Zigbee) routers, your network is unbalanced. For your second floor to be covered correctly, you will also need plenty of (Zigbee) routers on that floor. A single Homey Bridge will not be a miracle solution, as that will only be one single router (there’s nothing special about the Bridge as a Zigbee router).

i have 30 Light switches and 10 sensors to be more accurate. like a normal 4 Bedrooms house, every room and toilet have a light switch and only motion sensors in the toilet and corridor to turn on and off the lights automatically ( very simple setup )
my last try i will split both homey PRo and homey Bridge network into 2 different networks to work independently but that is a management nightmare besides i will have to pay subscription for the homey bridge and no rules between upper and lower floor. I really feel disappointed and very much tempted to go back to the aqara hubs as they were capable to extend zigbee over the same LAN

You say you bought a Homey Bridge to extend your Zigbee network to the second floor, yet you imply with this remark that you already have (at least) 5 Zigbee router devices on the second floor. That sounds like your second floor is already covered in terms of Zigbee range and I don’t really see the point of adding a Homey Bridge (which, like I said, isn’t a device that will magically improve things).

Can you make a screenshot of your devices table from this page: Homey Developer Tools

for a reason the homey Pro is only able to manage the switches near the stairs but when I go deeper on the upper floor it’s not working ! i believe the devices are not working as routers for a reason or another ! even with the homey bridge being in place…
when i configured the homey bridge independently ( not as a satellite and connect the switches to it directly they work fine) but when i add the bridge to the homey pro network ( it has no effect on the range ) I am sure i am misconfiguring the bridge under the Homey Pro


In the column “Type” I only see end devices, no router. Maybe the list is longer?
Except for number 34 they all seem reachable, see column “Last Seen”. You can verify per Zigbee device by clicking the ping command behind the 3 dots.

They are probably all no-neutral devices (that, or Homey is misidentifying them as an end device, which is something that seems to be happening with the HP2023’s for some reason).

In any case, I think we found the reason why the network isn’t working properly: no routers (but at least we now know that the new Homey will accept at least 40 directly connected devices :joy:).

@Tarek_ElRaey your network is extremely unbalanced. You need to add (at least) 5 to 10 proper Zigbee router devices if you want to make this work reliably across your entire house.

Yes I agree this is also what came to my mind. They are all no neutral devices which may be causing the issue.

I really love the honey pro interface and want to continue using it but I now need to find a way to extend it to upper floor.

Not sure why the honey bridge isn’t capable of doing it though

May I refrase without offending: Not sure why you are not capable of doing it though :wink:
You have to experiment a little. Use the ping command, Add some ZigBee walloutlets, which will act as Zigbee routers.
I can do it for you, but it will cost you a fortune😉

i am trying to get some smart zigbee sockets to be used as routers now and will see the effect on the network . I am not very optimistic but will give it one more try

Since your network is so unbalanced, and you have a lot of Aqara devices (see below), you may have to do a full Zigbee network reset and start over.

Aqara devices, especially the sensors, will in general not switch over to a “better” router device if you add it to the network. For them to switch over, you need to pair them with Homey again (if you don’t delete them first, any flows depending on the sensor device will remain intact), which is why it may be better to do a Zigbee reset and start building the network with routers first, wait for the network to settle, then add end devices at the location where you want to use them (so not next to Homey or a particular router and then move them).

ok I don’t mind resetting the whole house and repairing them again ( at least the upper floor ) … my concern now is that i returned the homey Bridge to the main Homey PRo network and brought them really close to each other but still i don’t see the list of Zigbee devices has changed or increased from 40 to 41 … that is why i believe the homey bridge is not participating in the Zigbee network at all, I can’t see any added value for it on my network. is there any step i am missing to make sure Homey bridge is participating as a Zigbee router to my network ?

Did you follow the steps from here?

Also, since all of your devices are directly connected to Homey, it may simple be “full” and not accept any new devices until you do a reset.

i am not sure, but i can still add more zigbee devices if they are on the ground floor or within the coverage of the homey Pro …
yes i followed the steps above, actually they are quite easy as you just need to add new device and the app will automatically detect the homey bridge and set it up under Homey Pro but then nothing more ! the device doesn’t give any indication it is acting as a router or getting any added value on the network.
I am thinking of upgrading to the beta Firmware 10.1.0-rc.4 where the zigbee satellite is being tested … worst case scenario is loose the hub and revert back to Aqara as it is not usable really for me without Satellite mode working properly

i have some good news but still under testing … after upgrading to the latest beta release, I can see homey bridge added with a router sign

Last update. I lost hope and reverted to Aqara hubs as they can extend the range perfectly and no reachability or compatibility problems … Homey was a great experience consolidating multiple vendor with a wonderful interface and user experience but without the capability to easily expand the network specially with Zigbee it is not for me .

now i have both Homey Pro and Homey bridge for sale in case anyone is interested