Zigbee buttons and scene remotes for Home Assistant

The best smart-home upgrade might be a button. No unlocking your phone, no explaining a dashboard: press once and the lights do the useful thing. Put one beside the bed, give a room its own scene remote, and keep movie mode within reach of the sofa.

Choose SONOFF SNZB-01P for a simple all-rounder, Philips Hue Dimmer for several physical buttons, or Aqara Mini Switch T1 when you want a slim little shortcut. THIRDREALITY’s Smart Button is the easy choice if you prefer standard AAA batteries. All four can feed Home Assistant automations through the documented Zigbee2MQTT route; THIRDREALITY also appears on Home Assistant’s certified-device list.

Research guide: specifications come from the makers; button actions and setup come from Home Assistant and Zigbee2MQTT documentation.

The parts lists are alternatives, not a bundle. Pick the controls you will actually use. You also need a Zigbee coordinator and connected lights or other devices for your automations: our coordinator guide and Home Assistant starter kit cover that foundation. Find the rest of the projects in the Home Assistant hub.

Quick picks: tiny shortcut or proper wall remote?

• Best all-rounder: SONOFF SNZB-01P. Single, double and long press give you a straightforward set of shortcuts. The linked pack contains two buttons, so you can give two favourite spots their own controls.
• Best multi-button remote: Philips Hue Dimmer, second generation. Four physical buttons make it easier to give different jobs their own places. Its wall mounting and handheld use also make it our renter-friendly wall-control pick.
• Best tiny pick: Aqara Wireless Mini Switch T1. Its 45 × 45 × 12 mm body is the slim option for a discreet scene button. This is the T1 model, WB-R02D; use its own device page when mapping actions.
• Best with AAA batteries: THIRDREALITY Smart Button. Press, double press and hold cover the everyday jobs, and its two AAA batteries are straightforward to replace. Home Assistant lists the 3RSB22BZ button in the Works with Home Assistant program.

Button or remote	Battery	Documented Zigbee2MQTT actions	Best fit
SONOFF SNZB-01P, linked 2-pack	CR2477 in each button	single, double, long	A simple bedside or scene shortcut
THIRDREALITY Smart Button	2 × AAA	single, double, hold, release	Everyday shortcuts with standard batteries
Aqara Mini Switch T1, WB-R02D	CR2032	single, double, hold, release, plus additional multi-click actions	A slim button with room to expand your mappings
Philips Hue Dimmer, gen 2	CR2032	Separate on, off, up, down press/hold/release families	A wall remote with distinct physical controls

Action references: SONOFF SNZB-01P, THIRDREALITY Smart Button, Aqara T1, and Hue Dimmer gen 2. Battery and fit specifications come from the SONOFF manual, THIRDREALITY product page, Aqara T1 specifications, and Hue product page.

Pick the radio route before sticking anything to the wall

Use the Zigbee network you already have. A button joins one coordinator’s network at a time; choose ZHA or Zigbee2MQTT for direct pairing. The maker’s own hub is another route, not an extra box you need beside a documented direct-coordinator setup.

Already using ZHA? Pair through Settings → Devices & services → Zigbee Home Automation → Add device, following the button’s reset instructions. Then look for its button presses in the automation editor’s Device trigger list. The integration supplies those names, so choose the gesture your device actually reports. THIRDREALITY is a particularly clear ZHA starting point: its button is on the official certified-device list.

Using Zigbee2MQTT? Pair the remote there and enable its Home Assistant integration, with Home Assistant’s MQTT integration connected. The linked device pages above document each model’s action values. After pairing, physically perform every gesture you intend to use: single, double, hold, and the relevant Hue button presses.

That last step matters. Zigbee2MQTT discovers each MQTT device trigger after the device has generated that action at least once. If a double press is missing from the picker, double-press the real button before rebuilding the automation. The Zigbee2MQTT Home Assistant guide recommends this device-trigger route; its old action-sensor method is deprecated.

Keeping a Hue Bridge? You can leave the remote paired to it and use Home Assistant’s Philips Hue integration, which exposes remotes as device triggers. Use that route or direct coordinator pairing for this remote, rather than trying to pair it to both.

Make your first press do something

Here is the current editor path for a physical button:

1. Open Settings → Automations & scenes → Create automation → Create new automation.
2. Under When, select Add trigger → By type → Generic → Device.
3. Select your button or remote, then select its press action. With Zigbee2MQTT, those are the discovered MQTT device triggers.
4. Under Then do, select Add action and choose the light or scene action you want.
5. Select Save, name the automation clearly, then press the physical button to test it.

Use By type, rather than looking only under By target: Home Assistant’s Device trigger documentation explains that button presses without an entity appear in the Device trigger picker. A remote can expose a battery sensor while its useful press events live elsewhere.

For the recipes below, create scenes under Settings → Automations & scenes → Scenes → Create scene. Add the lights, set their states, and select Save; enter the name and save again. The scene editor opens a new scene in Live Edit, so your lights change while you build it. An automation then applies the saved result with Activate scene (scene.turn_on).

Recipe 1: bedside “all off”

Use THIRDREALITY Smart Button and make the main press wonderfully predictable: the lights you chose turn off.

• When: select the button’s single-press Device trigger. Zigbee2MQTT calls it single.
• Then do: add Turn off light (light.turn_off) and select the lights you want included.
• Save and try it: turn those lights on, press once, and verify the intended lights go out. Press again; they should stay off.

Choose turn off, rather than toggle, for this job. A second sleepy press should not switch everything back on. Keep the target list focused on lights; a bedside shortcut does not need to power down your whole collection of equipment.

Once the main job feels natural, give double press a separate job, such as activating a low-light reading scene. Leave unused gestures alone until you have a reason to use them.

Recipe 2: a scene button for a kid’s room

Use Aqara Mini Switch T1 for a simple “reading or play?” choice. Create a Reading scene with the lamps at your preferred comfortable settings, and a Play scene with the room brighter.

• Single press: use the T1’s single Device trigger, then Activate scene and select Reading. Save.
• Double press: create another automation using double, then Activate scene and select Play. Save.
• Optional hold: use hold for Turn off light, targeting those room lights. Save and test that gesture separately.

Put a small, clear label beside the button: “press: read / double: play.” You are building a useful control, not a memory exam. The T1’s Zigbee2MQTT page explicitly includes the maker’s WB-R02D model and lists more multi-click actions for later projects.

Test each saved automation with the physical gesture. If you add a hold action, map it once; adding both hold and release to the same job can give one interaction two chances to run it.

Recipe 3: movie mode without the phone hunt

Use Philips Hue Dimmer when you want a remote that looks like a lighting control and can live on the wall between uses.

Create Movie and Normal lights scenes using the lights already connected to Home Assistant. Movie might dim the main lights and leave a lamp on; Normal lights restores the useful everyday arrangement. Our local lighting guide covers the bulbs, switches and scenes behind that setup.

With direct Zigbee2MQTT pairing, start with the power button’s short-release action, on_press_release, and use Activate scene → Movie. Save. Assign another button’s short-release action to Activate scene → Normal lights; press it first and select the corresponding discovered entry. Save that automation too.

The Hue action list separates press, hold and release events. Choose one event for each job. Mapping both on_press and on_press_release to movie mode makes a normal click run the same scene twice.

If the remote stays on a Hue Bridge, select the equivalent short-release Device trigger supplied by the Hue integration instead. Give each button one clear role, and label the wall plate if your choices differ from its symbols.

Want the same remote to start music? Our WiiM streamer guide gives you a local preset action to pair with a button trigger.

Make it work for everyone

A wireless remote is a control surface; your connected bulbs still need power. Place it beside the existing switch and leave that switch on for smart bulbs. For renters, the Hue remote’s no-wire mounting gives you a familiar wall control without changing the electrical switch. Follow the mount’s instructions for your wall surface.

The ZHA guide explains coordinators, battery-powered end devices and mains-powered routers. Choose the button’s final location after pairing, then test from that location. If it stops responding, start with its battery and network connection before rewriting your scenes.

These recipes run in Home Assistant, so keep your server running for the shortcuts. Direct Zigbee binding is a separate feature: the SNZB-01P’s device page specifically documents a binding limitation. Use the automation route described here for its scene jobs.

A quick test before you call it done

Use Run actions from the automation menu to test the lights or scene. Then press the real button to test the trigger as well; Run actions skips that part. Home Assistant’s testing guide explains the difference and how to read traces.

Press the same gesture repeatedly, then try each different gesture you configured. Check that each interaction runs the intended automation once, that a held button does not also select the short-press scene, and that the control still works in its final position. If something fires twice, look for overlapping press/release triggers or an existing automation for that button.

Buy SONOFF for straightforward shortcuts, Hue for a multi-button wall remote, Aqara T1 for a slim scene button, or THIRDREALITY for AAA convenience. Start with one excellent job per control. The best button is the one everyone reaches for without needing a tutorial.