So, I bought about 40 WiFi based Tuya-rebranded RGBW bulbs to dip my toe in the water (I have a big toe). I love having the RGBW options, although, I pretty much just set the bulbs to red after a 9 PM and back to 2700K during the day. They cannot easily be flashed with tasmota. While the cloud integration works well, it's a little janky (highly technical term) at the scale I'm at. I thought about kicking them over to Home Assistant but, there are shortfalls with getting full functionality back over to HE for RM integration.
I thought about swapping the bulbs out for something natively supported in HE. I've gathered three primary recommendations from perusing the forums which are LIFX, Sengled, and Hue. I imagine I'll toss Hue out just because of the cost but haven't gotten there yet. I'm going to work on building a spreadsheet to get a cost breakdown laid out for each option.
Are there other options I may have missed?
Are there certain models I should avoid (I suppose this would only really apply to Sengled)?
I have a handful of Zigbee switches throughout the house to act as repeaters, but would plan to add more...maybe the Third Reality outlets. I have very dense WiFi coverage, so, no concerns there. All the switches for the bulbs are Zooz scene controllers with the paddle control disabled.
I will say that LIFX's first two strikes are that they don't have a big variety of bulbs types and the uncertainty of the product line with Feit's buyout is worrisome.
Any time, just keep in mind that some bulbs, especially those running Zigbee Light Link protocol don't play nice with other devices. So from that perspective my recommendation is Sengled, as they are not acting as repeaters.
Those would be at the top of the list, but I have a mix of A19, canned down lights, and (shudder) candelabra bulbs to be replaced. Looks like their down light release has been put on hold due to the Feit buyout.
Honestly, the cost isn't necessarily a big hold up for me, but, the cost/value ratio is. I'm not a fan of buying a product that's double the price of their competitors without some clear advantage/benefit. I realize this isn't always tangible benefits.
Like the old Craftsman tools warranty (when they were owned by Sears) made them worth spending a little more on. You could break a tool in literally any way and they would swap it, in store, for a new one...no questions asked. You didn't even have to have a receipt.
Well, the Gen 1 bridge works with most of their lighting, has been obsoleted by Philips (so it only works locally on the Hue app), but only costs $5-10. Still works with Hubitat ......
And still cheaper than Hue...looks like the initial pricing on their downlights was planned to be ~$35/each. That difference adds up quick and would put a big gap between the two if LIFX is comparable in performance and what-not.
What I've put together based on current pricing. Surprisingly, there's not as much of a gap between LIFX and Hue as I would've expected:
Socket Type
Quantity Needed
Hue
Lifx
Sengled
A19/E26 - 800L
19
29.44
32.5
13
A19/E26 - 1000L
4
40
45
13
Down Light/E26
12
55
35
0
Candelabra
6
42.5
50
12
Repeaters
8
0
0
7.75
Bridge
1
50
0
0
1684.36
1517.5
433
For Sengled, I priced out their 800L bulbs to replace all of the A19s since they only have one option. They have no ZigBee options for downlights that I could find.
LIFX hasn't actually released their downlight, so I'd be rolling the dice that those will be available soonish.
Aside from the price...Hue does have some nifty lighting devices, but, if I'm honest with myself, I don't put enough value in "form" to buy most of them. LIFX's "Nightvision" bulbs look like a cool product in theory.
So I may be a little biased when recommending that linking the Hue bridge is better than connecting individual bulbs 
...but, I don't mind it either way.
