The vast majority of new-ish zwave 500 mains powers devices support beaming. One doesn't have to guess - just go look at the conformance report.
Which is what I've been saying for years, and why most people with a decent zwave plus install base should NOT need separate repeaters to make locks work....
I agree.
I have a very strong mesh, but I have 2 yale rd256 locks sitting in a room surround by 3 inovelli switches, one repeater and one high current switch. For some reason they still have issues communicating to my hub through the mesh. If I put my hub in the same room it works perfectly.
At this point I think its an issue with the locks/zwave module. Everything in my house works perfectly except those two. Even my two sensors sitting in my pool's basket to monitor temp and water level report in fine.
That's the real issue in the end...wireless signals are weird things. They go where they want, reflect unpredictably, etc.
I'm not saying repeaters don't help in certain situations - even with a good mesh - as sometimes they can. But that is more of a placement quirk/advantage than anything inherently 'better' about a repeater.
Now, @bcopeland is right that zwave 700 repeaters are likely beneficial in all cases. Not because they support beaming (although they do), but more so because they have more sensitive receive circuits (better antenna plus sensitivity) and MUCH higher transmit power (to the tune of about 10 dB higher).
Yep.. I already had a strong mesh and had no major issues.. But I did a overlay design where I specifically placed 3 700 series repeaters in key positions in my house.. And even with my already strong mesh I noticed a speed improvement.. It took a couple of days and a few repairs to see the full benefit..
@amdbuilder -- @gavincampbell is correct -- all our new devices (and actually our Gen 1's) support beaming, so you should be good 
This is also correct -- dang you guys are so smart
And like I have always said.. There is no such thing as too many mains powered plus repeaters..
So I have a bunch of Leviton zwave switches. How would I check if they support beaming or act as repeaters? They are all on a powered main. Some are 3-4 years old and some are 6 months? Or is it upgrade time?
No. I would do what @bcopeland recommends. Add 2-3 Aeotec Range Extender 7 into your z-wave network. Run a z-wave repair, let it settle for a day or two.
I posted this in another thread, but I'll repeat it here....
You don't need to run zwave repairs on zwave plus devices. That is leftover guidance that came pre-zwave plus before we had explorer frames. Pre zwave plus a repair was needed to rediscover routes. In zwave plus, that is what explorer frames do automatically - no manual repair needed.
Now, if you have any non-plus devices on your mesh, then yes you need to run repairs if you need them to rediscover routes.
That said, it doesn't HURT to run zwave repairs on plus devices, just isn't really needed unless you want to speed up the route update process.
No you don’t “need” to.. With explorer frames.. But it is still good practice.. Especially you would see that if you have ever watched that packet storm when explorer frames start blasting..
The explorer frames will happen whether you do a repair or not, so you get the traffic no matter what.
on a well maintained network you will rarely see explorer frames
I'll kind of disagree there. I've had sniffers on my zwave networks for over 3 years (since I went zwave plus), I am quite familiar with how often I see explorer frames. I continuously log the traffic and can query the database for them any time I want.
But what is the difference? Get a storm of traffic from explorer frames, or get a storm of traffic from a manual repair... Either route the network has to do the traffic to rediscover routes.
Not sure what we are debating? It isn't like one makes substantially less traffic than the other in the end.
Disagree all you want.. You are probably having mesh issues due to interference..
I only have 1 room in my house that I have issues with RF (I swear the room is in a faraday cage).. That is the only room that I regularly see explorer frames from..
Ok, you can be "right" if you want. I know exactly what causes an explorer frame to be sent... And I'm sure you know that too.
It depends on more than just how good your mesh is. It also depends on if you have devices that move physical location and how often you add/remove devices.
Um .. Duh.. It’s lost.. Which is why I always do a repair when moving devices around
Yes I do
Right.. Notice I mentioned interference as a source of this
The reasons I see explorer frames on my mesh have nothing to do with interference. But yes, that can also cause them.
Move some outdoor plugs around, which I do a lot, and see how many explorer frames you see. 
Still doesn't change my statement - if you have a fully zwave plus network you don't NEED to run a repair. That's simply a fact of how the protocol works, and isn't really debatable.
My point, though, was that a manual repair is not required for the device to update its routes. As soon as the device can't use last known route, and the other routes in the routing table don't work, it will do an explorer frame and rediscover route anyway. You don't NEED to do a repair even when moving a zwave plus device, but you certainly CAN.
Well I didn’t come here for a fight.. So I’m out
I wasn't fighting. 
I was just explaining how your one size fits all answer on explorer frames wasn't technically correct in all cases.
Anyway. The end. I give up.
Download the Hubitat app
