Hey!
This isn’t a guide of any sort, I’m just sharing that this is possible.
I started early and collected a bunch of Zigbee devices from different brands without a clear plan. until I found Aqara, and with Matter it helped bring everything together and dust off the unused devices.
thanks to open-source projects such as MatterBridge and Zigbee2MQTT (Z2M) on GitHub that made it even easier to integrate all my devices.
Using a Raspberry Pi 5 and a Zigbee stick from SMLIGHT, I set up Z2M and successfully connected all my Zigbee devices into Z2M.
From there I installed MatterBridge and using the built in Z2M plugin all Zigbee devices showed up on the webui.
All I had to do was scan the Matter QR code generated by the MatterBridge web UI and add it as a Hub—which I did in both the Aqara Home which was super fast and easy and later over at Apple Home.
Now, I can use any Zigbee device I want in a fully local environment, supported by Aqara’s powerful local automation engine and easily accessible through the Apple Home app.
Some of the devices I use:
Tuya Zigbee finger bot
Xiaomi BT Temp sensor with Zigbee FW (LYWSD03MMC)
IKEA Buttons
Aqara devices from china (on Global server)
