Hi, I’ve been googling and searching this site for a DH for the Ikea Tradfri/Home Smart (the new name) Gateway. There are several reasons I’m looking for this. First of all is Homekit integration, which allows me to tell Siri to turnoff all lights. The other thing is being able to use dimmers. And I am also struggling With adding bulbs and Wireless drivers to the SmartThings HUB.
I also see that some users struggling With the dimmers/5-button Control unit.
If I could use the Gateway the same way I use the Philips Hue bridge that would be a good solution, at least for me.
Unfortunately no integration is possible between the Tradfri gateway and SmartThings at this time. It is up to IKEA to make this possible if they want, and so far they haven’t.
(Note That you also cannot add the ikea gateway to a Hue bridge or a Vera plus hub.)
The Zigbee Limitation: Only One “Coordinator” Per Network
First it is important to note that the zigbee profile that SmartThings uses only allows for one primary “coordinator” per network. The ST hub is one. The Tradfri gateway is also one. So each of these expects to own its own network and to be the only coordinator on it.
(Zwave handles this differently, and does allow for secondary controllers. But zigbee does not.)
Philips made the decision from the beginning that they wanted to handle this differently for Hue. So they used a completely different architecture. The Hue bridge does act as a zigbee hub for its own mini network of the zigbee devices that are connected to it. But it also has an open API which allows other systems to communicate with it, either cloud to cloud or LAN. Note that it does not use zigbee for these third party communications.
So: IKEA could have done that, but so far they haven’t. And probably won’t, as it would increase the cost of their own device. Note that the Tradfri gateway also doesn’t have an IFTTT service. (One reason the Hue bridge is more expensive is that it does more stuff.)
So: one zigbee hub per network, and the ST Hub is it.
As far as using Homekit with ST, there are two methods.
HomeKit method 1: HomeBridge
The first, as @sidjohn1 already mentioned, Is to use the “homebridge” emulator, which basically makes SmartThings look like a Hue bridge to HomeKit. You will need additional hardware and the technical setup is quite complex, but it gives you a lot of features, including individual control of most devices. The people in the thread he linked to can explain more.
Homekit Method 2: Siri Shortcuts
The second newer method which has only been available for a few months is to use Siri shortcuts. No additional hardware needed and it’s simpler to set up. But you basically have to create one Integration applet for each command you want to say. So it works quite well if there are only 3 or 4 voice tasks you want to share, but above that setup can get quite tedious. And it’s really a Siri integration, not a Homekit Integration. And it can have some lag.
So the shortcuts method should work fine for a few voice commands like “turn off all lights” at night, or “Hey, Siri, good morning.” But it’s probably not going to work for more granular controls or for automations.
Thank you @JDRoberts for a very good explanation of why this doesn’t work. Hopefully Ikea will change their mind in the future. I think I will need to look into the HomeBridge solution then. Or just start using my Google Home mini for those commands.
This post is rather old but wanted to add personal experience to it for anyone else who comes across it searching. Using the Google Assistant app with Siri Shortcuts expands capabilities quite a bit. I was looking for a way around having to unlock doors in automations and it works for that if you include the pin. Photo attached with example and using NFC tag as trigger.
Homebridge is a lot easier to implement and maintain now in my experience using the Homemanager 2 app and a raspberry Pi. Set it up entirely from my iPhone. It has an Import Config feature that’s quite handy.
The great thing about Homemanager 2 and HOOBS imo is that it’s made adding devices or services on par with adding anything in Alexa, Google Home or ST. You don’t usually have to worry about directly updating the config.json. If you do, the Homemanager app (only at this point) has the Import Config feature which pulls the sample from your clipboard into a GUI form where you just enter the parameters. It handles the formatting and syntax. You can even add plugins to use both Alexa and Google Home to control your Homebridge devices. Although I just heard my spouse ask Siri via the HomePod to play an amazon music playlist. That’s not going to work. Aside, but reminds me to mention devices added through Homebridge show up as unsupported in the Home app.
We basically use the newer version of the plugin referenced above Homebridge-smartthings-v2 and corresponding smart app. It’s pure genius. Since I had already invested a lot of time getting everything into ST for ActionTiles, just adding this one plugin exposed all the devices in the Apple Home app. I did tweak the config.json for this plugin just because OCD and wanted it formatted differently.
I still really like ActionTiles. The rest of my family prefers that familiar Apple UI and centralized control. My daughter wears an Apple Watch to help track and manage a health condition so it’s nice for her to easily control devices with it too. Honestly the watch app is pretty meh but doable. SmartThings has a good Watch app. There’s other options as well.
If you’re in the Apple ecosystem and using SmartThings I’d suggest at least looking into the Homemanager 2 app/HOOBS and Homebridge-smartthings-v2 to expand your options. If I can use these, I feel confident anyone can. I’m definitely still in the shallow end of the smart home pool sporting arm floaties.
Just opening this one again, as I would like the Tradfri gateway to integrate with ST, rather than the devices themselves.
Why, you may ask ? The simple reason is for firmware updates on my blinds - I have 8 of these, and just taking one offline and pairing with Tradfri for an update then hoping it pairs back with ST in the same configuration is quite an undertaking.
It seems that Home Assistant is able to integrate the Tradfri gateway into its product, and presumably its using an API of some sort judging by the remarks here https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/tradfri/
The Homekit thing is a nice-to-have but I’m also running HomeBridge, so its not really needed.
HomeAssistant itself is just software, so it doesn’t have the issues I described above of trying to have two primary zigbee coordinators on one ZHA or Zigbee 3.0 network.
In the homeassistant configuration the Ikea network is essentially forming its own zigbee network and the integration is through the WiFi side.
So you still can’t do what the OP for this thread was asking, which was to have the Ikea zigbee end devices on a SmartThings zigbee network and then add an Ikea gateway to that same network.
It might be possible to isolate Ikea end devices to their own gateway and then create the WiFi integration to the gateway, but then none of the Ikea end devices would act as zigbee repeaters for the SmartThings network, which is what most people want.
So a hub to hub integration of some sort might be possible via WiFi, as homeassistant is doing, but the two hubs still can’t share their devices at the zigbee level.
So in your case, your blinds would always belong to the zigbee network established by the Ikea gateway and following the homeassistant model you might be able to create a WiFi integration where the SmartThings hub could ask the Ikea hub to tell the blinds to do something. But that’s basically the same idea as the homebridge approach.
I wanted the Ikea Gateway to work in a similar way to the way the Hue does with ST.
Both gateways are on a wired IP network - same as Hue/ST
Devices (Blinds and Blind Remotes, for example) are setup and controlled by Tradfri - just like Hue
They are also created as Parent/Child devices in ST through a Gateway integration - like Hue
Blinds on ST are good, but the slight delay in remotes controlling the Blinds - compared to instant on Tradfri - plus the firmware upgrade problem makes this almost essential.
Surprised no-one has done this already, as HomeAssistant and OpenHAB have done - although I do recognise they’re software solutions and hardware agnostic…
I would also like what Shaun_Reinson is asking for here. Support to integrate with the Tradfri gateway the same way as HomeAssistant and OpenHAB (over LAN, not zigbee) so that Blinds did not have to disconnect and reattach between the two hubs (Smartthings and Tradfri/IKEA Home Smart) for firmware updates and local tradfri functionality would have been perfect.
I will look into using IFTTT as a “gateway” between the two for my needs, but would be nice to utilize tradfri devices without an external component as IFTTT or the likes.
