SONOFFZigbee USB Dongle Plus-ZBDongle-E 3.0 External Antenna Interface SMA Gateway Universal, Pre-Installed with Zigbee Firmware Based on EZNet 6.10.3 Coordinated Home Assistant or Zigbee2MQTT

For anyone starting their smart home journey, the SONOFF Zigbee 3.0 USB Dongle Plus-E Gateway is a fantastic choice. This gateway has been a rock-solid performer in my own home lab setup, seamlessly integrating with my virtual machine running Home Assistant. Its impressive range and reliable performance have made it a cornerstone of my smart home ecosystem.Effortless Passthrough for Virtual Machine Integration:One of the key advantages of the Plus-E Gateway is its ease of integration with virtual machines. I was able to effortlessly pass the device through to my Home Assistant virtual machine, allowing me to manage my smart home devices directly within the platform. This simplified setup process was a major bonus, saving me time and frustration.Unmatched Range for Extensive Coverage:The Plus-E Gateway's impressive range is a game-changer. Despite my server being located in the basement, it flawlessly connects to devices on the second floor, ensuring complete coverage throughout my home. This eliminates the need for additional repeaters, saving money and streamlining your setup.Rock-Solid Performance for Stable Connectivity:Throughout my experience, the Plus-E Gateway has been a beacon of stability. I haven't encountered a single dropped connection or any other performance issues. This reliable operation provides peace of mind, knowing that my smart home devices are always under control.An Excellent Starting Point for Your Smart Home Dreams:If you're just starting your smart home journey, the SONOFF Zigbee 3.0 USB Dongle Plus-E Gateway is the perfect foundation. Its ease of use, impressive range, and rock-solid performance make it a fantastic choice for anyone looking to build a reliable and future-proof smart home system. I highly recommend this gateway to anyone who wants to start automating their home and enhance their daily life.Overall, the SONOFF Zigbee 3.0 USB Dongle Plus-E Gateway earns high marks for its seamless integration, impressive range, stable performance, and ease of use. It's a fantastic choice for anyone looking to take their first steps into the exciting world of smart homes.

While Philips (Signify) has been working hard to force a cloud account on their customers to continue using Hue light bulbs, I've been testing numerous Zigbee products to find an alternative that will allow my family to continue using their bulbs before they turn them all off- or turn us into their product.This works great! It's plug & play with Home Assistant (HA) on a cheap Raspberry Pi. No more Hue bridge, no more worrying how long until Philips starts charging me a monthly fee to use light bulbs I've already paid for.Pros:- Works with every Hue product I have- Great distance (I no longer need two Hue bridges to cover my house)- Virtually Plug & Play with HA (plug it in, it gets detected and prompts for installation and detects your devices)- No cloud account required, no privacy/security concerns, no corporation selling you a product then forcing you to route all their data through them years after you've purchased their products.- Works flawlessly with Apple Home productsCons:- Doesn't work with Amazon Alexa in HA without going through some hoops.- Setting this up on a Raspberry Pi with Home Assistant is still a bit geek-oriented requiring a little instruction-following.

Over the past year, I've bought 3 for various installations in different places. I used one each with each of Raspberry Pi 3, 4, and 5. I use them with Home Assistant.They work great.Hint: connect them to a Raspberry Pi by way of a USB extender cable about a meter long to keep the dongle away from all the interference that the Pi puts out.

Easy to set up with a few tutorials online. Definitely get a USB extension cable so it can be mounted away from interference. Using it with z2m and it just works. Was able to update with ember drivers with another tutorial. Still new to adding items to me setup but so far so good

Flashed the latest drivers to it and plugged it into my usb hub and it worked instantly with HA.

I bought this to use with Home Assistant on a Raspberry Pi 5. The system detected it immediately when I connected it, and I followed an Internet video to install it in the software. It works.I followed the advice of everyone in the community to plug it into a USB 2.0 port with an extension cable, rather than a USB 3.0 port or even directly plugging it into a USB 2.0 port - this isn't the fault of this device but rather a fault of the Zigbee protocol itself and of USB 3.0, as USB 3.0 ports tend to generate RF interference that causes trouble for Zigbee devices. The device doesn't need the extra speed of a 3.0 port, and the extension cable allows it to be placed with more flexibility anyway.

I have these installed on my Home Assistant systems to provide Zigbee connectivity. This interface was auto detected and easy to configure. I have been happy with the range and it is really fire and forget. There are a surprising number of things that use Zigbee and I use it with ZWave, Insteon and Matter at the same time. For a fairly low price you open up a lot of options for connectivity.

Using on my HA server running HAOS. Was supported natively, using a HP ProDesk 600.