Comparison of Home Automation Platforms

Company Talks Official Announcements
#1

We want to help users to see in one place ALL the capabilities of a home automation system, which are available on the market.
We need your input for the following:

  1. Expand the list of the capabilities
  2. Expand the list of the vendors
  3. Add metrics for each capability (based on your experience with a specific vendor)

There are many things that can be considered when a user chooses his/her home automation system and by creating a table with ALL capabilities of available products we aim to help users to choose the system that best fit their use-case.

The list of the capabilities will be updated here.
Anyone should be able to access it, and weā€™ll add your feedback in the excel. Below you can see a screenshot from the excel:

Screenshot 2020-12-18 at 17.29.31
Screenshot 2020-12-18 at 17.29.311613Ɨ647 106 KB

As a rule, if we add a vendor that sells hubs, we must pick a specific hub for comparison.
Weā€™re waiting for your feedback.

UPDATE: Here is the link to the full list of Command Classes for Z-Wave, weā€™ll keep it updated for Ezlo and with your help we will mark what other vendors support.

5 Likes
#2

Vera Plus is a pretty decent hub, if you mainly use Z-Wave devices.

Pros:

  1. Local control - but has issues with keeping correct time when Internet is down.
  2. Functional web based UI7 GUI for setup and configuration purposes.
  3. Backup / Restore feature works well and auto backups to cloud servers
  4. Wide range of 3rd party plugins for expanding support for other devices, I use AltHue and Logitech Harmony, Hikvision amongst some others.
  5. Had a good range of 3rd party dashboard apps, AutHomation HD, Imperihome now Home Remote and others.
  6. Easy to use HTTP API / Luup Requests users can use to control and integrate their Vera with other apps and devices on their local network.
  7. PLEG and Reactor rules engines by 3rd parties that are very powerful. These plugins alone saved Vera Control LTD !
  8. Can use LUA code in scenes for more advanced things.
  9. Good community forum, but lacking from what it once was now.

Cons.

  1. Firmware updates have historically been very dicey if they will brick your system or not or give you problems. Although firmware seems more stable in recent times.
  2. Terrible Vera mobile app that never worked well and is getting worse.
  3. Slow to add new device support and its linked to firmware updates, Ezlo have made it possible on their firmware, for them to add device support without a major firmware update needed which is good.
  4. No native Rules Engine and limited logic in Vera scenes.
  5. Customer tech support not as good as it use to be, in the past it was excellent and very responsive and one reason I stayed with Vera over the years.
  6. Vera / Ezlo seem to be lacking in overall direction as far as development is concerned. They have some good ideas but poorly implemented sometimes and they have some bad ideas where is UI8 web GUI ? That should of been built first after the core firmware not dicking about with the Vera mobile app.
  7. Life time of the Vera hubs now in doubt and new ones can no longer be purchased except the flagship Vera Secure?
  8. Vera also had Zigbee support that never worked properly. Ezlo should be addressing this on their new hubs with Zigbee 3.0 but the two Zigbee devices I have tried pairing havenā€™t worked properly as yet.
  9. Bluetooth radio never functional.
7 Likes
#3

Homeseer (SEL/HS3)
Pros:

  1. Fully local; via HTTP/HTTPs, mobile app and optional HSTouch interface.
  2. Multiple user accounts with variable permissions
  3. Backup/Restore functionality for HS system as well as ZWave network. The whole install can be moved to a different machine in just a few minutes, even shifting from Linux to Windows.
  4. Wide range of 3rd party plugins (100 free currently available, 200-300 paid) Integrations range from MQTT to Tesla, Roomba, DSC, Ecobee, Rachio, etc.
  5. Can work with other dashboards (Home Remote, Imperihome)
  6. Can use RESTful and JSON calls to integrate with other systems (i.e. HomeBridge)
  7. Event and automation system is very robust, comparable to PLEG and Reactor out of the box.
  8. Supports .NET scripts (VB & C#) & development on Windows and Linux (via Mono)
  9. Good community forum with plenty of activity. (At the time of posting, there were 344 users online at forums.homeseer.com)
  10. Software updates have been reliable and easily managed.
  11. Mobile app available for Android, FireOS and iOS. Fairly customizable. Not as good as Imperihome or AuthomationHD but adequate. Can be set to only work in local mode for use on tablets. Is lacking an import/export/backup function.
  12. Z-wave environment is very robust. Device inclusion/exclusion is very fast (a fraction of the time of UI7) and there is a dedicated free app to make device provisioning easy (ZTool+ for iOS and Android). The Zwave network doesnā€™t have ā€œhealsā€ that impact performance as the mesh management does a very good job at establishing routes on enrollment. System uses command class interrogation to create sub-devices. Supports associations, multiple controllers, sending parameters in events, as well as changing lock PINs in events. There are advanced Z-wave apps (Z-Seer+) that can edit Zwave networks manually and update firmware (Z-Flash)
  13. Tech support seems ok. Beyond one issue with terminology during installation, I havenā€™t actively needed it in the past 2.5 years. I have used their videos to set up scene controllers with illuminated indicators, which was handy.
  14. Each ā€œgenerationā€ of HS software seems to last about 5 years. Prior generations remain fully functional, though new plug-ins are curtailed after a while and older plug-ins drop out as developers pull them from distribution. (HS2 forums are still live and posts still pop up every week or two)
  15. HS devices are capable of significant upgrades as they have hardware that is between 4x and 20x more powerful than Vera/Ezlo hardware (Pi3b/x86).
  16. HS has a built-in Text-To-Speech option under both Linux and Windows.
  17. HS can run as a service on Windows and can use Windows Accessibility Services for fully local speech recognition for voice control. Local voice control can be set per-device and there are functions for voice reminders.
  18. Built in support for sending/receiving email
  19. Robust logging system. Searchable by keywords and dates. Scripts can readily add custom log entries.
  20. Supports Alexa (both voice APIs), Google Assistant and IFTTT.
  21. HS4 came out earlier this year. It is closer to HS3.5 than a total rewrite as all HS3 plugins will continue to work. The improvements are intended to expose plugins to the mobile app and introduce some additional optional cloud services.
  22. HomeSeer is actively expanding their 1st party HomeSeer branded plugins. They hired one of their prolific 3rd party devs to make new plugins. They also purchased 90% of his plug-in library and made them free.
  23. HomeSeer store supports payment processing and ties it to the main license, making it easy for developers to monetize their products.
  24. Plugins can be installed manually outside of the homeseer store.

Cons:

  1. Zwave development is stalled, waiting on updated SDK from ZWave Alliance. Current SDK doesnā€™t support Windows and Linux development in one code base and HomeSeer wants to keep the two environments in synch.
  2. native (1st-party) Zigbee support is still a work in progress without using a paid plug-in (JowiHue).
  3. UI is not shiny. Itā€™s not ā€œJava appletā€ ugly but itā€™s not pretty.
  4. HS has a LOT of options and generations. It can be difficult to find documentation for a specific feature for a version of HS (VB vs. C#, Windows vs Linux/Mono, etc).
  5. because there is so much functionality out of the box, scripting is more the province of app developers, creating a barrier to entry by segmenting it from ā€œend userā€ documentation.
  6. A sizable chunk of plugins do require payment. They can all be tested for 30 days, so itā€™s not a blind purchase. Often there is a basic ā€œfreeā€ app and then a more feature-rich paid version.
  7. Advanced Z-wave apps (Z-Seer+, Z-Flash+) are paid purchases or require the PRO license. Their mesh network quality is high enough than Z-Seer is not really needed and there are only a few z-wave devices that have firmware updates so itā€™s not always a problem.
  8. Some technologiesā€™ 1st-party plugins are abandoned. Insteon is the most notable.
  9. The ā€œPiā€ version of the HomeSeer license is limited to 5 plug-ins. I only run 7 plug-ins and could readily live without 2 of them.
  10. HS version upgrades are not free. The cost varies based on license version. (They do make the new version a free upgrade for purchases made after the new version has been announced)
3 Likes
#4

Thank you @cw-kid @kigmatzomat for your input, we took it one by one and added in the excel the capabilities and checked for each system what is supported based on your input.

To everyone, please share with us some tests examples to show the performance of the hubs.

#5

Can you give ideas of metrics you are hoping to see? Most of what were listed are features.

The only item I listed above that is quantifiable as a metric would be dis/enrollment time.

With the ztool+ app, from pulling out my phone to a successful dis/enrollment is under 30s. My experience with dis/enrollment on vera was it took 2-3 minutes, factoring in the dis/enroll failures that happened regularly on Vera. I never experienced that on HS, even with 30-odd devices that were on both platforms.

Enrollment would only take longer if you need to add a new room/group or donā€™t like the name automatically added.

The heals that cause vera Linux firmware zwave to be nonresponsive arenā€™t present, so thats 0/x -> infinity as a percent.

#6

Time it takes to turn one light on, in local mode or cloud mode
Time it takes to turn 50 lights on, in local mode or cloud mode
etc etcā€¦

This way we can build a ā€œperformance baselineā€ for each hub

#7

50 lights? Maybe a metric a normal person would meet?

HS SEL using a zwave scene controller can turn 6 zwave plugs/power strips on/off running holiday lights in a small fraction of a second.

Using the mobile app on cellular network takes under a second.

#8

Are we talking proprietary closed source commercial solutions or open source solutions.

I could list off at least eight different products (platforms) Iā€™ve used or are currently using and this would take forever. While I think the question is quite valid it appears to be a little naive. No single platform is better than the other as thereā€™s no platform out there that will satisfy all you needs.

The Vera Edge was a very credible controller for me for a number of years but like most devices on first purchase I outgrew it as I discovered other options and my home automation needs grew.

I mainly use C#, JS and Python now and choose my platform based on this. Hardware wise I use the single board computer, in my case the Rock64 4gb running Armbian Linux. Iā€™m able to build my own kernel to satisfy the peripherals I use. Itā€™s a tinkering board and thatā€™s what I like about it. All the software platforms I run on it do so happily.

In short, the Vera Edge was an ideal entry point for me when compared to something like HomeSeer price wise. Since then other solutions have been implemented which better suit my needs.

I do hope that the new incarnation of the Vera controller, the Ezlo hub serves the user as reliably as the Vera controller did for me starting out.

#9

These two statements speak volume about the failure of the Home Automation industry!

Its a long journey, but my goal is to provide a platform that you cannot outgrow and donā€™t need programming skills to operate! (Wish me luck :slight_smile: )

In the meanwhile weā€™ll try to bring as much transparency as possible by identifying all the capabilities of all the systems/platforms out there (closed or open source) to educate the end users.

1 Like
#10

https://community.getvera.com/t/after-ezlo-vera-what-do-you-recommend/216134/42?u=monsterdykaren

Made some suggestions of hubs that should be in the list in another thread. Posting a link to it since I Canā€™t acces the Google doc.

#11

Very hard to measure since there are so many parameters that are different in different setupsā€¦ Must be tested in same Place with same conditionsā€¦ I canā€™t do a test and then compare it to one that you have doneā€¦/Mattias

#12

Agreed. At best we provide data points.

I have a mix of Jasco, zooz, hank, monoprice, fibaro and greenwave devices in my lighting events. Some are outdoors, others indoors, and spread across 2 floors.

My internet is also a cellular link and not hardwired.

And as we have seen from existing vera products, the size of the network, mix of plugins and services also running can be an issue.

#13

A Home Automation ā€˜platformā€™ should support the integration, within a home, of a wide variety of devices, support a wide variety of communications protocols, over a wide variety of media. The ā€˜platformā€™ should not lock the user into one vendorā€™s product family, nor into a specific technology. X-10, Z-Wave, UPB, Ethernet, ASCII, Wi-Fi, and all other other means where one device passes data to another device need to find a home in a single platform, which offers the ability to respond to events through user-written scripts in plain language. A system that enables the use of Appleā€™s HomeKit or Alexa or whatever else to control all manner of switches, dimmers, etc regardless of manufacturer, industry association, protocol. It is out there. Go find it.

#14

I donā€™t disagree except for homekit. The only way to link a full controller to it is a developer backdoor used by homebridge.

Pretty sure no commercial product can ship with homebridge functionality included without getting hit by Appleā€™s billion dollar lawyers

#15

any features we are missing in the list guys? Please help us create the most comprehensive feature comparison list in the home automation world!

#16

Have a look here

I think there is only 1 thing not supportā€¦ zwave 700. But hey who needs that?

Zwave is dyingā€¦

#17

good evening. history record.

can ezlo integrate temperature modules, door sensors into the Google assistant? or is it like vera that only gives modules on / off and scenes?

#18

I think there is more than 1. They donā€™t support Meshene do they?

#19

2 then.

Meshene? Does anyone need it?

#20

What is it? Google returns nothing except a family name or a us metal band.

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