Ikea's Trådfri Smart Plugs Gain HomeKit Compatibility

[Erlang]

A couple of caveats, I've previously added the Tradfri lights to a Hue Gateway without an Ikea Gateway, but yesterday I bought an Ikea Gateway and a Tradfri control outlet.

It turns out you can't add the Control Outlets to anything without at least one Tradfri remote control device such as their wireless on/off switch; dimmer; or motion sensor. So I have to return to pick one of those up today. Pretty annoying as that's not clear on their website, or the store display.

Ikea product codes are:

Motion sensor 303.835.11
wireless dimmer 003.478.31
remote control 503.522.74

Control outlet 003.644.77
Tradfri signal repeater 804.242.55

 

[ignatius345]

I wouldn't mind a few smart plugs, but i have no idea what i would actually plug into them

Same. I rack my brain to figure out what I'd use these for and the only thing I've been able to come up with is firing up the A/C before I get home in the summer. But even that's a little bit of a stretch as both our units have built-in timers that enable them to power back up after X number of hours. I can generally anticipate my arrival home pretty well, and it's also not the end of the world if I come home and the A/C is not on.

Put quite simply, for every appliance and light I have at home, if I'm not home, it's probably off. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[whooleytoo]

Does it really need a bridge or were you able to just use it standalone?

As I understand it - if you just want to use the Tradfri smart plugs/bulbs with the provided remote or switch, you don't need anything else. But if you want to use the Tradfri app to control them, or - in my case, the Neeo Remote and Brain - then you also need the Tradfri Gateway.

I'm open to correction, but I believe the Tradfri plugs are based on Zigbee (IEEE 802.15.4), and if you want to control them from any non-Zigbee device (Wifi etc.) you'll need the bridge. Neeo does support Zigbee, but is implemented to interact only via the IP bridge/gateway devices for some reason, simplicity or cost-saving etc.

 

[Websnapx2]

I’m sorry to police this thread but this is just plain misinforming people. You cannot have TRÅDFRI Bulbs or Outlets in Homekit without a Gateway - so if you control your devices in Homekit, you have a gateway - you probably just forgot or misunderstand the specifics of the question. The TRÅDFRI devices - just like HUE devices - are Zigbee controlled units (NO WIFI), and thus cannot be controlled by homekit or a smartphone app without a gateway/bridge.

For a device to be Homekit compatible directly it would need WiFi or Ethernet Built-in so it can talk to the Homekit HUB (Usually your iPad or a Apple TV).

The first smart bulb I had bought was a Hue bulb (on it's own) and it worked just fine without a gateway. It worked so well that the second addition to the group I made was a starter pack with 4 bulbs and a gateway. The gateway added more functionality but my bulbs had absolutely worked without one. I then added a few TRÅDFRI bulbs — at that point, obviously, I had a gateway already. I was not saying the TRÅDFRI outlet didn't need a gateway — quite the opposite — I was asking if the switch would update it's firmware off of a Hue gateway or if I had to get a TRÅDFRI gateway just to update to switch to work with homekit.

You don't need to police anything — I know very well what happened with the products I purchased and implemented, and have been doing this for a very long time. The Hue bulb worked on it's own out of the package with no gateway and was controlled with Siri.

 

[beanbaguk]

Ikea needs to improve their hub reliability first! It's achingly slow, frequently locks up, and requires a daily reboot to keep it running. (No other device on my network has this issue).

I bought just a few Tradfri lights as they were so cheap compare to my Hue bulbs, but I have to confess, I wish I'd just invested in the Hue bulbs instead. The Tradfri remote switch isn't programmable like the Hue one, and the hub often disappears off the network and the only solution is to reboot. In fact, I've even attached a smart plug that does a daily reboot late at night to keep the hub going!

On top of this, the hub has very limited functionality and the bulbs are no way near the same quality as the Hue bulbs. The brightness gradients are very poor and they dim to quite a high level. (10% is as low as you can go, and it seems like you have 10 steps). Hue bulbs are more flexible.

Overall, I'm not happy with my Ikea purchase. You certainly get what you pay for and it shows with the Ikea bulbs.

I don't remember exactly how much I paid but I believe each one is about €10. If you hunt around and wait for the sales, the Philips ones cost about 15eur each if you buy multi-packs and while that's 50% more, it's worth every penny.

 

[Der Keyser]

The first smart bulb I had bought was a Hue bulb (on it's own) and it worked just fine without a gateway. It worked so well that the second addition to the group I made was a starter pack with 4 bulbs and a gateway. The gateway added more functionality but my bulbs had absolutely worked without one. I then added a few TRÅDFRI bulbs — at that point, obviously, I had a gateway already. I was not saying the TRÅDFRI outlet didn't need a gateway — quite the opposite — I was asking if the switch would update it's firmware off of a Hue gateway or if I had to get a TRÅDFRI gateway just to update to switch to work with homekit.

You don't need to police anything — I know very well what happened with the products I purchased and implemented, and have been doing this for a very long time. The Hue bulb worked on it's own out of the package with no gateway and was controlled with Siri.

Whoaa you must be the most lucky person on earth. Either you accidentally got a unreleased prototype HUE lamp with built-in Wifi, or you got a prototype unreleased iPhone with Zigbee built-in...

For the rest of us: You cannot interact with the trådfri or hue systems from an app on your phone unless you have a gateway - that includes Siri ofcourse . Yes, they can easily work on their own/standalone, but that requires you to purchase a dedicated zigbee remote control (which is easy and cheap with the Trådfri setup)

 

[x-evil-x]

I personally couldnt add any Ikea stuff to my hue setup. I had the ikea hub but was curious If I can load it onto the hue hub and didn't work. All apple products no android stuff not sure if that makes a difference or not. I had to pair my shelf lighting, spotlights and on off switch to the ikea hub with the shelf being on the remote control I'm using for it.

 

[whatta]

Hi there, fellow Europeans. I am from Belgium and the smart plug is added (automatically) to my iOS Home app. I just needed to go the tradfri app and search for firmware updates. It updated the gateway and the plug and all done now. So the update is not only for the US. Enjoy
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Is the update US only?

I have some EU plugs, and according to the apple store, the Tradfri App has no new update.

No need to update the TRÅDFRI app, just the firmware of the ikea stuff via the TRÅDFRI app..

 

[GaryMumford]

Hi there, fellow Europeans. I am from Belgium and the smart plug is added (automatically) to my iOS Home app. I just needed to go the tradfri app and search for firmware updates. It updated the gateway and the plug and all done now. So the update is not only for the US. Enjoy

No need to update the TRÅDFRI app, jus the firmware of the ikea stuff via the TRÅDFRI app..

I'm still not seeing the new firmware in the UK, Is anyone in the UK seeing it??

 

[Paultmaine]

Uk plugs / outlets have just been updated with HomeKit support

 

[whatta]

Now that it seems it works fine for all of us, I am very happy it was not a hardware limitation, just a firmware update. Nevertheless I still wonder what technical difficulties made them half year to overcome to enable Homekit.

 

[Paultmaine]

Now that it seems it works fine for all of us, I am very happy it was not a hardware limitation, just a firmware update. Nevertheless I still wonder what technical difficulties made them half year to overcome to enable Homekit.

I know what you mean, it seamed to take forever more so because I bought the plugs on first release, but very happy now

 

[daveak]

It turns out you can't add the Control Outlets to anything without at least one Tradfri remote control device such as their wireless on/off switch; dimmer; or motion sensor. So I have to return to pick one of those up today. Pretty annoying as that's not clear on their website, or the store display.

You can actually add a device without a remote control, at least with the outlets. Factory reset the outlet by using a paper clip, the light should start pulsing, then press the pair button on the gateway for about 10s. Open the Ikea app and it should hopefully say device added. It only shows up as a disconnected device, but does appear in HomeKit and works fine. Took a couple of attempts to pair one of my outlets.