Nest thermostat as a hub

Devices & Integrations
1

I’m having a debate with a colleague at work as to weather a nest thermostat can be used as a hub in the way that the smartthings hub is used. Im thinking it can not but having a hard time proving that with the list of “works with nest” compatible devices. Could you please hell here? Both my colleague and I both agree that a true smart home needs to require very little input from the users of the home and the home should largely function as an intuitive system that reacts on its own with little to no intervention of the user once it’s up and running.

Thanks in advance!

2

First thing that comes to mind is it only does WiFi and bluetooth so that leaves a lot of the most common devices that you’d like to connect to a hub :slight_smile:

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3

That was my first thought too. No zigbee or zwave.

4

Besides Wi-Fi, Nest has a built-in 802.15.4 radio, which is the same low-level protocol used by Zigbee, although instead of Zigbee, Nest uses proprietary Weave protocol. So theoretically Nest could act as a hub if they decide to support Zigbee HA profile, but as far as I know that’s not in the cards.

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5

The whole Works with Nest program is simply anything that connects to their api officially - it’s got nothing to do with Zigbee or Z-Wave.

For instance, you could write a service that monitors anything and does something via the Nest app.

For instance,

  • Nest Cam detects motion, play a sound via Sonos
  • Take a feed for power outage schedules in your area and automatically tell Nest to heat your hot water up before the power goes out

There’s no Z-Wave integration, which is why you need something like Nest Manager to act as a go between for SmartThings and Nest

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6

Haven’t you heard? The whole Smart Home “hub” model was dead when devices like the Nest came out. It’s awesome how we no longer need a “hub”.

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7

Isn’t that pretty much the route Wink went ? Their hardware sucked, so they just went forward with the app that integrates everybody else’s hardware into one interface and no hub.

8

The Problem with Nest Is that they use Thread as there main short distance communication protocol over Zigbee and Zwave. There is currently very little documentation and examples of thread based products. The reason they use this is that Google owns Nest and Google is the main stake holder in the Thread protocol. I am sure over time as google pours money into Thread and more Thread enabled chips become available this will become a much greater hub option.But for now SmartThings is the much more accessible platform.
Another issue is that Nest is much stricter for example you can only keep data gathered through nest API’s for 10 days. SmartThings has no limit.

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9

Thanks for the response! I wasn’t aware of the 10 day limit on nest api.

10

Of course you can keep the data for longer I doubt they will know. But still…

11

It won’t get approved for official use as they have to approve them all, otherwise you’re stuff with a 50 user limit