Frient joins Works with Home Assistant
Miranda Bishop
We’re making new frients this week, and they’re bringing an extensive line of Zigbee devices to our Works With Home Assistant program
Our newest frient
Based in Denmark, the frient brand was developed by Onics, (formerly Develco Products), and they have years of experience with Zigbee devices. Frient is bringing its proven technology to the Works With Home Assistant program, as well as their Danish design that easily blends into almost any home.
Recent Works With partners have brought Z-Wave, Matter, and even Bluetooth devices to Home Assistant, but it’s been a couple of years 😅 since Zigbee-specific devices have joined the program. Zigbee is one of the most popular open protocols that is used with Home Assistant, with hundreds of thousands of users making use of it today. It’s a proven technology that connects directly to Home Assistant, no cloud or Wi-Fi connection required. Zigbee is a mesh protocol, where some devices act as repeaters, strengthening the network as more are added. It was built from the ground up to power the smart home, and has been optimized to give devices really long (sometimes multi-year) battery life.
"Joining the Works With Home Assistant program is a proud milestone for frient. It reflects our strong commitment to open, user-centric smart home experiences and ensures that our products seamlessly integrate with one of the most trusted platforms in the market. For Home Assistant users, it means more choice and flexibility — and for frient, it strengthens our position as a key player in the connected smart home space."
- Martin Langballe, International Business Development Manager at frientAll you need to get started with Zigbee in Home Assistant is a Zigbee adapter or ‘stick’, such as the Home Assistant Connect ZBT-1 (wow, we released this in 2022, I wonder when we’re finally going to build a successor? 😉). By plugging the adapter into a USB port on your Home Assistant system, it should then discover the device and add the ZHA integration. After that is set up, you can start adding devices to your Zigbee network. We’ve even added in a cool new visualization so that you can see how your Zigbee devices interact with each other.
ZHA is built with the support of the Open Home Foundation, and it even has a full-time developer (@puddly
Devices
When your energy company won’t provide your raw usage data, there’s always another way 😉
In case you didn’t know, Works With Home Assistant differs from other certification programs as products are rigorously tested in-house to ensure they work seamlessly out of the box with Home Assistant. Any company joining also commits to providing long-term support and firmware updates while being a positive force in the Home Assistant community. Works With Home Assistant is operated by the Open Home Foundation
Our team has worked extensively with frient to ensure that the following items work seamlessly with Home Assistant.
This is a big portion of frient’s product line, and provides energy monitoring, device control, safety, and security sensors. The frient IO Module is the first certified Zigbee module that can be used to turn low-voltage dumb devices like electric blinds or garage doors into devices that can be controlled by Home Assistant.
There are some great devices here for building a more sustainable smart home. The Electricity Meter Interface 2 LED allows you to get the data off your energy meter and record it into Home Assistant. Another win for sustainability is their use of AA and AAA batteries wherever practical, meaning you can use rechargeables instead of constantly buying and recycling coin cells.
I also selfishly love to see some great UK-specific devices being brought into the program with the frient Smart Siren having both UK and EU versions.
Best frients forever
It’s great to see Zigbee get some high-quality certified Works With Home Assistant devices after a multi-year wait. Frient has put a good deal of work into this launch and are big fans of our work and the community. There are more exciting Zigbee developments to come, so stay tuned!
FAQs
Q: If I have a device that is not listed under “Works With Home Assistant” does this mean it’s not supported?
A: No! It just means that it hasn’t gone through a testing schedule with our team or doesn’t fit the requirements of the program. It might function perfectly well but be added to the testing schedule later down the road, or it might work under a different connectivity type that we don’t currently test under the program.
Q: Ok, so what’s the point of the Works With program?
A: It highlights the devices we know work well with Home Assistant and the brands that make a long-term commitment to keeping support for these devices going. The certification agreement specifies that the devices must have full functionality within Home Assistant, operate locally without the need for cloud, and will continue to do so long-term.
Q: How were these devices tested?
A: All devices in this list were tested using a standard HA Green Hub with the ZBT-1 and with the ZHA integration. We haven’t tested these devices with Zigbee2MQTT, so we would recommend checking their device compatibility documentation
Q: Will you be adding more frient devices to the program?
A: Why not! We’re thrilled to foster a close relationship with the team at frient to work together on any upcoming releases or add in further products that are not yet listed here.