Some lights on after power outage

I've got a couple lights that come on after a power outage.

One of them is a sengled bulb that in the settings is set to remember last state.

I always had this issue on S.T. but the work around there was a smart bulb that's never on. If it turns on, it was a power outage and turns the other bulbs off.

What are our workarounds here?

FWIW, my hub and network gear are on a big UPS so that's not an issue.

Probably not the answer you're looking for...

My solution to this problem was to use genuine Hue bulbs on a Hue bridge. This provides both power restore behavior options, as well as native HomeKit support. I can also have those lights integrated with numerous other systems all at the same time. I use Lutron lighting for the same reasons as well. Both have been extremely reliable.

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What driver are you using for this? I don't think the built-in Sengled drivers have an option for this (it may have been added recently; I haven't used one lately), and the new "Advanced Zigbee..." bulb drivers' option for state on power restore does not work with Sengleds (nor are these drivers the recommended ones for those devices, though I do happen to prefer their behavior in pretty much every other case--so I do it anyway).

For this specific situation, I also use Hue bulbs on a Hue Bridge, as mentioned above. For devices paired directly to Hubitat, it depends. Some devices have an on-device setting for this (the Inovelli Z-Wave bulbs, for example). The "Advanced Zigbee..." bulb drivers sort of fake this at the driver level but don't rely on any on-device feature, so your luck may vary from bulb to bulb, but it's still probably the best you can do if it works.

Otherwise, I've seen some people use some power monitoring solution. Some UPSes can send something over USB that you might be able to intercept (not directly with Hubitat but with something in between). The 2nd-gen Ring repeaters with a built-in battery can also send events when power is lost, so you can use that information to guess when your home may have lost power and your bulbs might be on. I think I've seen DIY solutions with a DC power supply, a relay (powered by that), and a contact sensor (with external contacts the relay will open/close with power loss or restoration).

But if you want to know what I personally do: nothing. :slight_smile: I only have few of these bulbs (the rest are Hue), power losses aren't super-common, and if they're on for a few hours before I notice...they're LEDs and one of the least power-hungry devices I have control over. I could turn them off by VPNing in (or using a Dashboard--if I had one set up for this--or the new Devices tab in the app) or maybe use an automation to tell me if a suspicious bulb has remained on for longer than it probably should be (assuming the reporting is accurate), but...I've haven't been bothered to yet, so I usually just do it when I get home. If it's the middle of the night, none are in my bedroom, so at least that much is good for me!

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I have a similar issue, I use Hue for my bulbs, and when power is restored they turn on. In my case, this is in my vacation home, so I do a periodic rule check for the status of HSM, and if away, then no lights should be on, so if they are I simply turn them off.

Writing this, I started to think about an alternate method, if there are x minutes since the hub turned on, and if light are on, then turn them off ? Ideally, it would be best to record the status periodically and then x time after restart, restore that state ?

Why not use the Hue bridge? Then you can set their power restore functionality to your liking.

@scoob8000 , if you use the Sengled specific driver (not legacy) then turning off after power restore is built into the driver but likely dependent on a strong mesh status post power restore.

Power outage and power restored = operate the bulb using regular wall switch

Some bulbs, if not most, are made to be compatible with wall switch operation or WAF, so it's default to turn on when power restored (or turn on wall switch)
(and yes, my wife only uses wall switches so all my bulb must be turned on after power restored, unless I changed all my wall switches to smart switch which again is against WAF)

Using Hue Bridge doesn't really solve the problem (correct me if I'm wrong or Hue bulbs are hardware capable), which is same as using the Advanced Zigbee Driver. The bulb is turned on before even connected to the bridge or hub, then after connected the Bridge or Hubitat based on the preference to turn it off automatically so you still see the bulb turned on for a while. It's a workaround though not cleanest.

For Inovelli bulb, its driver has a real working Power fail and restore setting, not sure about other bulbs.

Update: Halo bulb is another one I found working with Advanced Zigbee Driver's Power Restore State on the bulb level (not Sylvania and Ecosmart)

Hue bulbs are hardware-capable (or at least if they have relatively recent firmware--since this feature was introduced--but all bulbs dating back to the original are capable of being updated).

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I think it only works with Hue lights, of which I have none.. :slight_smile:

I see; you’re using a Hue bridge for bulbs, but not Hue bulbs. Probably would be better to have another HE hub for bulbs, which is what I did, but then replaced most of them with Hue :man_facepalming:t3:. Now I have 2 HE hubs and 2 Hue bridges.

Yes, turns and circles often replace the straight path in Home Automation :slight_smile:

Reason for using Hue is just some separation. Hue is rock solid, handles power outages well (of which I have a few) and generally HE and Hue work well together and mostly my Ikea and other Zigbee bulbs work on Hue (bar the power outage settings).

Yeah, I'm not buying yet another hub to add minor functionality. I already have the HE and Lutron hubs.

Bertabcd1234,
I swear I remember seeing that setting on the Sengled device page. Unless I was using a generic driver at one point.

For my other devices, a lightify strip, and a couple red series inovelli switches that started coming on after a failure. I found that the state after failure was not set in the driver page for those devices.

I know they were set. Awhile back my hub crashed and I had to do a soft reset and restore. Perhaps that's when this issue started for me.

I have hue bulbs on hue bridge and mine come on after an outage . I.double checked the settings and they still come on. So.I gave up.and wrote this rule.



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That is really strange. I have two Hue bridges and 2 different generations (with and without Bluetooth) of Hue bulbs, some color and some white ambiance. None of them come on after an outage; not even briefly.
Although, I’m not familiar with the bulbs and firmware you posted.
Much different than mine: