Hue Phillips

Hi, I am hubitat user, however I got a hue hub as a gift. I’m a little confused and how to use it along with my hubitat hub. I don’t have any hue bulbs, but I do have some zigbee lights bulbs, but they are already paired with my hubitat. Can I move them to the hue? Any benefits to use hue hub ? Thanks!

I find it useful for extending into their native app. I also use Node-Red for some automations and there are many more integrations with Hue than the standard Hubitat integration.

Overall, you'd be fine not using it if you're not looking for these things. Two rules I try to keep: Keep it simple AND If it isn't broken don't fix it...

so whats on your hue hub.. you cannot have light bulbs on both hubs directly.. you can have devices on hue and then also on hubitat using the built in hue app, but not vice versa.

I use my Hue Hub for all Zigbee light bulbs so that they are not used to repeat sensors that are paired on my HE hub. If you have non repeater bulbs, the benefits will be negligible.

You need to first install the built in hue app and have it connected to HE. Then unpair the lights you want to move over to Hue and pair them on that hub.

Then you will be able to control them via HE in rules and more just like before, only difference is that those repeating bulbs will stop messing your Zigbee mesh.

If they are third-party (i.e., not Philips Hue) bulbs, then the benefits of moving them to a Hue Bridge will be limited. But there may be some benefits regardless: many Zigbee bulbs are known to be poor repeaters on Zigbee networks that include both bulbs and other types of devices (e.g, switches, dimmers, motion sensors, etc.). This has caused problem for some users on Hubitat. Some bulbs, possibly newer ones, are likely fine, but I'm not sure anyone has objectively tested this (notable offenders from the past include GE Link, Cree, Sylvania/Osram, and Hue). A Hue Bridge solves this problem by keeping them on their own Zigbee network, where they're perfectly happy.

But even if they aren't Hue bulbs, you'll still get some advantages. Hue is rock-solid in my experience, and it has a variety of accessories that can work directly with Hue (e.g., Hue Dimmer, Hue Tap, Lutron Aurora, etc.). It's also very easy to set up "groups" in Hue (also possible in Hubitat, but arguably easier here) and can use real Zigbee scenes (Hubitat has "scene" capabilities, but not at the Zigbee level like groups; it's generally faster and more reliable to use real ones). My Hubitat is rarely down (really just for firmware updates), but my Hue Bridge is down even less and so I pretty much always still have some way to control my lights if needed (so...basically during firmware updates...ha).

Unlike first-party/Hue bulbs, what you won't get with a Hue Bridge is native HomeKit support or some Hue-firmware-only features like default power on states. Everything else should work, like Alexa and other third-party integrations.

But I can't deny the advice above...you know, about "fixing" things that aren't broken. :slight_smile: You will also have to do some work if you want to change this configuration, since as mentioned above, Zigbee devices can only be paired to one "hub"/network at a time--so you'd need to move them to the Hue Bridge, then use Hubitat's built-in Hue Bridge Integration or a similar community solution to add them into Hubitat. The Hue to Hubitat integration, then, is really LAN and not Zigbee. I personally prefer this setup for many reasons--but if yours is working for you, maybe keep it.

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Well I do have some issues with some of the bulbs, sometimes they don’t respond as they should. So if I move them to Hue hub I can expect a better experience?

I think most people find problems with the other devices more than the bulbs in this case (though there are some lingering issues with Hubitat-paired bulbs not handling certain commands when sent in quick succession--a fix is coming in the future). So, I can't guarantee that your bulbs will work better (if that's not the problem), but I suspect they will be regardless. Your other devices are also likely to work better if you have any, too. :slight_smile:

I should note that not all Zigbee bulb can pair to a Hue Bridge, but any Zigbee Light Link (ZLL) or Zigbee 3.0 bulb should be able to. Zigbee Home Automation (ZHA) bulbs will not be able to pair; in the US, common examples of these are at least the older Sengled/Osram ones (but they are ZLL in Europe) and Sengled (which are actually fine on Hubitat as they do not repeat).

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So I moved my bulbs to the hue, so far so good.
Do I have create the routines using the hubiat app or the hue app?

Given you have them on the Hue bridge you can do either, rules or apps on the HE hub can control the Hue bulbs using the built-in integration app on the HE hub, or you can setup lighting rules on the Hue app.

The choice, I think, depends largely on what type of rules you want to create and what other devices or conditions you want to be able to introduce into those rules. If you want to introduce conditions around modes in HE or contact sensors connected to your HE hub, then rules on the HE hub may be the way to go. If you have Hue accessories such as motion sensors or dimmer switches also connected to the Hue bridge, then that may be the place to setup your rules.

Simon

Personally I use the the Hue Hub only as a way to isolate Zigbee devices, so all my rules and controls are all on HE. I feel it's a lot easier to do it that way and make sure I don't have one rule going against what the other hub is doing. Just like most people that have multiple HE hubs, they usually do all control from a single hub just to make it more manageable.

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Exactly, that is important as well. Although I didn't spell it out in my post, that was also something that was front of mind for me as well. In my previous setup I was happy to have lighting separated on the Hue bridge and certain transitions triggered from the HE hub, but these were just mode changes and rules on the Hue bridge reacted to that change, so all the logic of how to manage the lights themselves was still handled in the one spot, HE was just reporting a change in mode.

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