Are Tuya local keys permanent (like a MAC address)?

6 months ago by batmaniam to c/homeassistant

Hi All,

Bargain outlet near me had a bunch of the “monster smart illuminessence” stuff at a price that made me try one.

A few hours later and I have them running properly on LocalTuya. I went and scooped up a bunch more given the success.

My question is: When is the local key issued and when does it change?

I’d like to get them all taken care of and put in the box with key written down so I can delete the official tuya app, and also not have to worry about if Tuya will change it’s dev policy so I can’t get access to the keys anymore.

As a side note, I’ll give Tuya credit, I can easily see where that is a great tool for folks looking to offer smart goods… it’s also exactly why I’ll always be local only.

YodaDaCoda 12 points 6 months ago

I have a few devices I've connected via Tuya Local. The key seems to change upon removing/re-adding to an account. Definitely not burnt-in like a MAC address.

In the past I've just re-installed the Tuya app when I've added a new device, but I also have concerns about Tuya disabling local control in future so I'm trying to avoid Tuya stuff and run esphome instead where possible.

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limelight79 3 points 6 months ago

Yeah I've had some I had to redo when they were offline for a while (weeks, not hours or days - but I don't know how long).

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batmaniam 1 point 6 months ago

"re-adding to an account" as in an official tuya account? That makes sense. Awesome to hear about re-installing the app with no problems, thanks!

Yeah, esphome is by far the better way to go, but at $2 a bulb (plus a short RGB addressable wifi LED strip), I'll take some headache until they break...

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limelight79 3 points 6 months ago

I highly recommend setting up a zigbee network. Avoids these headaches, saves wifi bandwidth, etc. Just be careful about what channel you use for zigbee and wifi to avoid interference.

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batmaniam 1 point 6 months ago

I actually have a few zigbee devices! It was strictly just the price on these. $2 for both a bulb and a LED strip with the wireless controllers already on both made them a good part to have around. No way I would have bought them normally.

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limelight79 2 points 6 months ago

Yeah, but I think you see why many people avoid them.

I have two Sengled zigbee bulbs (note they also make wifi bulbs, so be careful) that have been outside in fixtures on the porch for a few years now, and I've never had a hiccup. And we get pretty extreme ranges of temperatures here - single digits to nearly 100 F.

These are what I have, but there are other brands too.

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vividspecter 3 points 6 months ago

I'm going to echo the zigbee recommendation for bulbs. Can be had for dirt cheap and work reliably (and there's high end options too if you want that). And are fully locally provisioned and controlled.

Matter over thread is also becoming an option but the default provision option requires Google (including play services and an account) and they tend to be quite a bit more expensive.

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batmaniam 1 point 6 months ago

Yeah i like zigbee a lot! Although I havent really needed the meshnetwork aspect or had issues with wifi (ie: esphome). I've been reading about Matter, what's the Tl;Dr on why it's better than zigbee or just MQTT?

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vividspecter 2 points 6 months ago

The main benefit of Matter is that it is split into two layers (Matter and Thread) where as Zigbee is essentially one layer that handles everything. This makes Matter more flexible, since it can work over both Wifi and Thread (and any future protocol at the same layer). At the moment there isn't a huge advantage, but in the future if the standard succeeds, you would hopefully be able to buy most smart devices and use just one protocol (Matter) to control and integrate them.

At the moment, the main advantage I can see is that more wifi smart devices can be locally controlled because they have Matter support (which requires it). Which historically, was limited to HomeKit over WiFi, ESPHome/Tasmota flashed devices, and sometimes through Home Assistant integrations that found a way to locally control devices for a given company.

Because I didn't really explain Thread, I'll just quickly say that it's a protocol much like WiFi and the "closer to the hardware" part of ZigBee. I'd prefer buying Matter over Thread vs Matter over WiFi devices, particularly if you're planning to build out a Thread mesh network (the Matter over wifi devices won't help in that).

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