Bathroom automation's lagging. What gives?

Hey everyone, I just solved an issue that had been bothering me for half a month, and I thought I’d share it in case it helps someone else out there.

I’ve got a bathroom setup with a motion sensor connected to the lights for automation purposes. At first, it worked fine but with some noticeable delay. For instance, when you walk in, it takes about 1 to 2 seconds for the light to turn on, and sometimes it wouldn’t trigger at all. Seemed pretty buggy to me.

Initially, I suspected it was a battery issue, so I even opened up the device to check, but it wasn’t the case.

After carefully reviewing the automation settings, I discovered that by default, it was set to perform “cloud automation”. As you can imagine, this means the command goes through a server before being executed, which naturally causes delays.

So, I made a small adjustment to enable local execution instead of cloud-based. Right after making the change, everything worked much smoother, and now the light turns on instantly as soon as you enter the room.

Therefore, if you’re experiencing similar “laggy response” issues, check whether your setup is using cloud automation and ensure that all devices are under the same gateway to support local execution. This tweak should make an immediate difference.

That’s all – hope my little experience can be of help to you!

1 Like

@Omnivia Thank you for sharing your experience with the community! It’s great to hear that switching from cloud automation to local execution resolved the lagging issue with your bathroom motion sensor setup. This is a classic case where shifting the automation logic to the local gateway can significantly improve response times, as you’ve rightly pointed out.

In the Aqara smart home ecosystem, local automation ensures that commands are processed directly by the local devices rather than relying on cloud servers, which can indeed introduce delays. As you mentioned, ensuring all devices are connected to the same gateway is crucial for this setup.

Your insights are invaluable, and I’m sure many users will find this information helpful. Keep sharing your smart home experiences, and let’s continue to learn from each other!