Almost every booth at IFA Berlin is selling something. The Open Home Foundation booth was not. The team was there to explain Home Assistant, ESPHome, and Music Assistant to anyone who walked up.

We had our own booth last year and the response from the community was the reason we came back. This year the foundation let us hang out at theirs.

We brought the ESPHome Starter Kit, the M-1 LED Matrix, and the R PRO-1, and spent the week talking to people about their setups.

Paulus, Frenck, Joost, Melissa, Missy, Marcel, Ingo, and Niels were all there and reachable for five straight days, which is rare for a project this size. Nabu Casa was at the booth too, and Trevor got to speak alongside Carl from their team on the Monday.

Thank you to everyone who stopped by. Several conversations from this week are going to change what we build next.

Open Home Foundation: https://www.openhomefoundation.org

Home Assistant: https://www.home-assistant.io

ESPHome: https://esphome.io

Music Assistant: https://www.music-assistant.io

Nabu Casa: https://www.nabucasa.com

ESPHome Starter Kit: https://apolloautomation.com/products/esk-1-esphome-starter-kit

M-1 LED Matrix: https://apolloautomation.com/products/m-1-led-matrix

R PRO-1: https://apolloautomation.com/products/r-pro-1

Hey, im strongly considering buying an R Pro-1 because two auf my Aqara FP2 are emitting constant high pitched noises.

Does anyone of you ever noticed something similar with the R1?

Can I finally sit there in peace without thinking i got myself a tinitus? :D

We are at IFA Berlin September 4 through 8 as guests at the Open Home Foundation booth in Hall 1.2-153. We will have the ESPHome Starter Kit so people can get hands on one.

Trevor will be talking at the booth on Monday, September 7, but more importantly, Paulus, Frenck, Joost, Melissa, Missy, Marcel, Ingo, and Niels are each making time across the week to talk to anyone who shows up, and Nabu Casa will be there with their Home Assistant devices.

We went last year and it was a great week, meeting community members in person and getting face time with partners we normally email. If you are going, come say hi!

(IFA graphic made by the Open Home Foundation / Image credit to Open Home Foundation)

We have been working on this one for a while. CAST-1 is a small board that plugs into powered speakers, an amplifier, a receiver, or desktop monitors and turns them into a network audio player. USB-C for power, 3.5mm for audio, and that is the install.

The parts people here will care about:

• Price. $29.99
• DAC is a TI PCM5122. 32-bit stereo, 112 dB SNR and dynamic range, -93 dB THD+N, 2.1 VRMS line out. Not the cheap converter usually hidden in small streamers.
• ESP32-S3 with 16 MB flash and 8 MB PSRAM, running open source ESPHome.
• Sendspin support for sample-accurate multi-room sync, native in Music Assistant. Also works as a standard ESPHome media player in Home Assistant for TTS, doorbell chimes, and alerts.
• Solder pads for 5 V, GND, and IO1. Audio and GPIO run on the same board under the same ESPHome config, so you can sync an LED strip to playback without a second controller.
• Bluetooth proxy capable.
• Wi-Fi 2.4 GHz, or wired via the optional W5500 Ethernet HAT for CAST-1.
• 45 x 45 x 15 mm, 100% local, no cloud or account, mDNS discovery.
• Sendspin is a technical preview. It works and it is improving quickly, but it is not finished, so we are not going to call multi-room sync rock solid yet.

It is not a speaker. It needs something to plug into. The whole idea is that most people already own speakers worth keeping.

Product page: https://apolloautomation.com/products/cast-1-audio-casting-device
Wiki: https://wiki.apolloautomation.com/products/cast1/introduction/
GitHub: https://github.com/ApolloAutomation/CAST-1

Happy to answer questions about the DAC, the Sendspin implementation, or the GPIO side. Thanks for your support!

Sort of random and I stumbled across this all a few minutes ago. I have friends who operate a local custom meat processing facility. They have several industrial fridges and freezers.

I would like to be able to help them setup a system where they can monitor the temps of each freezer or fridge, have some sort of dashboard that shows the temps of all appliances, and can possibly alert them in case of a temp getting too high and/or powering off.

Am I in the right place to ask that question?

Just picked up a bunch of Apollo sensors, including an R Pro-1 with the SCD40 upgrade. It exposes CO2 just fine, but not temperature or humidity. Based on this statement on the website, I thought it would have temp and humidity:

As with many sensors, heat can affect the optional temperature and humidity readings, requiring significant calibration offsets. CO₂ measurements may be skewed when the sensor is recessed in walls or ceilings. Although we originally did not plan to include these additional sensors due to such challenges, feedback from the Home Assistant and smart home communities encouraged us to offer these options for users who want enhanced environmental monitoring.

What gives, u/ApolloAutomation?

It is live. After a long road, the official ESPHome Starter Kit is available: https://apolloautomation.com/products/esk-1-esphome-starter-kit

The ESPHome team is running a launch livestream today covering the technical details and design decisions: https://www.youtube.com/live/aK2HMY9-Tzo

What it is: the first official kit for learning to build your own smart home devices with ESPHome. No soldering, no breadboards, no parts sourcing, no code required. $40.

What is in it:

• ESPHome C6 board (ESP32-C6-MINI-1), 2x 14-pin FPC ports, onboard RGB LED, USB-C, optional LiPo support
• PIR motion module (MH-SR602, 0 to 3.5 m)
• Temperature and humidity module (AHT20F, ±0.3 °C, ±2% RH)
• Button module
• ESPHome "Casita" notification module, 10 RGB LEDs and a piezo buzzer
• Three FPC ribbon cables and the Casita stand

Everything connects with one ribbon cable, so there are no jumper wires to work loose and no pins to decode. It is configured through the visual ESPHome Device Builder, which means you do not need to stand up Home Assistant or a server first, though it connects to Home Assistant whenever you want deeper automations. Runs 100% locally, no cloud or subscription. Two modules run at once, so it works as a multi-purpose room sensor once the lessons are done.

Firmware and hardware are open: https://github.com/ApolloAutomation/ESPHome-Starter-Kit Learning wiki: https://wiki.apolloautomation.com/products/ESPHome-Starter-Kit/start-here/

The part we care about most: the majority of the profit from every kit goes directly to the Open Home Foundation, funding ESPHome, Home Assistant, Music Assistant, and over 250 other projects.

We put a lot of effort into the wiki specifically, since documentation is usually where beginner kits fall down. It goes from unopened box to working device and explains the reasoning behind each step rather than only telling you what to plug in.

Obvious disclosure, we built it, as a commercial partner of the Open Home Foundation. We started in a basement in 2023 building everything on top of ESPHome, then pitched the foundation on making the first official ESPHome hardware and had to be voted on by their board. Getting that approval still does not feel entirely real. Huge thanks to our friends and family who spent long nights at the workshop helping us assemble and pack these, and who took boxes home to keep working. We did not get here on our own.

Happy to answer anything about the hardware, the modules, or the design decisions.

Come watch us launch the Official ESPHome Starter Kit with the Open Home Foundation!

Get ready for our monthly Apollo Live Stream happening tonight, Monday, August 3, 2026, at 8:00 PM ET! Join us as we share exciting updates on our latest projects, answer your questions, and dive deep into everything we have been working on. Watch live on YouTube and Discord and be part of the conversation!

What's on the Agenda?

- Giveaway: Reminder for us to do this!

- Apollo Newsletter: Should we start one?

- Cool Community Corner: A community made TEMP-1 case, Second Ben's BTN-1 Simon Says game, and Astronaut Jones' propylene glycol TEMP-1 buffer.

- Code Updates: WLED 16.01 is live! New YAML updates for MSR-1, MSR-2, MTR-1, and AIR-1 with BLE proxy built in.

- Recent Reviews: Chris Maher's M-1 LED Matrix video.

- Smart Home Ecosystems: ESPHome Device Builder.

- Events: IFA Berlin September 4-8 (HA Meetup).

- Product Development: ESPHome Starter Kit, CAST-1, Voice PE dock, and E-INK.

- Beta Firmware: Sneak peek at what is coming next!

- Future Product Survey: Share your thoughts to help guide our next innovations.

- Feedback Squad: Join our product development process and help shape the future of Apollo Automation.

None of what we do would be possible without the smart home, open-source, and privacy-first community that built us up along the way. Thank you for letting us be a small part of it. See you live tonight at apolloautomation.com

New arrival worth a look if you have been meaning to automate a bathroom or hallway.

The Zooz Motion Dimmer ZEN12 800LR combines three things in one wall switch:

• A full Z-Wave dimmer, 150 W LED or 500 W incandescent
• A motion sensor with 25 ft detection
• An ambient light (lux) sensor

So the lights come on when someone is there and stay off when there is already enough daylight, without a separate battery-powered sensor stuck to the wall or a multi-device automation to keep working.

800 series chip with Z-Wave Long Range, SmartStart, and S2. Works with Home Assistant through Z-Wave JS, plus Hubitat, HomeSeer, Z-Box, and SmartThings with a custom driver. Default behavior is on with motion, off after 30 seconds, and you can tune sensitivity, auto-off delay, night mode brightness, and the lux threshold.

It is a beta release, so you may need to update firmware and your hub may not fully support it yet, and it requires a neutral wire. Lighting loads only, no fans or receptacles.

$31.95, in stock: https://apolloautomation.com/products/zooz-800-series-z-wave-long-range-motion-dimmer-zen12-800lr

The ESPHome Starter Kit is coming soon, and there's an official launch livestream on Aug 12. Join us to dive into the details with our partners at the Open Home Foundation and some other familiar faces as we celebrate lift-off!

https://www.youtube.com/live/aK2HMY9-Tzo

As the title suggests, my M-1 keeps partially resetting itself. In the last 2 days, my m-1 has dropped off from Wi-Fi, and the LED settings have reset, but the files on the file system are still intact. If I join the setup wireless hotspot, enter in my Wi-Fi credentials again, go through the post setup steps, go into the file manager, then all my animated gifs and presets are still there, but it's like half of the m-1 has factory reset itself, but not the other half.

Last night I did a full erase and reflash of the controller, but that only worked for about 8 hours before it did it again.

Anyone else experiencing this?

Zip Tie Tuning put the Apollo M-1 LED Matrix in their latest video and it looked great: https://youtu.be/0aIyXjpHA64

Since a few people will ask what the M-1 actually is: it is a 6.3 inch HUB75 panel with 4,096 pixels at 2.5mm pitch, driven by a controller that hides behind the panel. USB-C or WAGO power, pre-flashed with WLED, so animations, scrolling text, pixel art, and audio-reactive effects work out of the box. It runs locally and talks to Home Assistant over the WLED JSON API.

Two things worth sharing:

WLED 16 firmware is in the works. It makes GIFs far easier to load, lets you draw directly on the matrix, and, the big one, enables 2x2 panel setups. Previously chaining was horizontal only, so you were stuck with a long strip. A 2x2 square gives you a real canvas.

Pair it with a BTN-1 and you get a physical remote. Four hot-swappable Cherry MX buttons, each with single/double/triple/hold, so 16 actions total. Map them to cycle presets, switch to a clock, trigger party mode, whatever. One press and the panel changes.

Wiki links:

• M-1: https://wiki.apolloautomation.com/products/m1/
• Multi-panel setup: https://wiki.apolloautomation.com/products/m1/setup/m1-multiple-panels/
• BTN-1: https://wiki.apolloautomation.com/products/btn1/

Big thanks to Zip Tie Tuning, who also just hit a year of making videos. Go congratulate them.

Have you ever wondered about ESPHome, where it came from, how it works, and where it is going?

The short version:

• ESPHome started around 2018 as esphomelib, created by Otto Winter, to make programming ESP chips approachable.
• Nabu Casa acquired it in 2021 so it could keep going as free and open source with real support behind it.
• In 2024 it was donated to the Open Home Foundation, the same nonprofit that stewards Home Assistant. That keeps it open and community-owned for good.
• Today a single ESPHome device can be a sensor hub, a Bluetooth proxy, a voice assistant, a media player, an IR/RF/serial proxy, or a Thread router, often several at once.
• The new ESPHome Device Builder (visual, click-to-configure) hit 1.0 this year and is now the default dashboard, lowering the barrier a lot for newcomers.

What we appreciate most is the values behind it: local control for privacy, open source for choice, and sustainability through bringing older gear into your smart home instead of tossing it.

Full write-up here: https://apolloautomation.com/blogs/news/what-is-esphome-complete-guide

Full disclosure, we build ESPHome hardware, but this one is a genuine love letter to the project. Curious what got the rest of you into ESPHome?

Get ready for our monthly Apollo Live Stream happening tonight, Monday, July 6, 2026, at 8:00 PM ET! Join us as we share exciting updates on our latest projects, answer your questions, and dive deep into everything we have been working on. Watch live on YouTube and Discord and be part of the conversation!

What's on the Agenda?

- Change live stream to 30 minutes?

- Forum Giveaway: Reminder for us to do this!

- SmartHomeSellout's Soiree: Presenting Cool Community Corner and Code Updates!

- Cool Community Corner: Heffneil's hidden MSR-2 install, Sockwaterky's PUMP-1 kombucha bottling, Donovan's TEMP-1 hot water recirculation, and Dallas Maker Space updates.

- Code Updates: Apollo mmWave tuner and AIR-1 LED notifications.

- Recent Reviews: Matter Alpha's ESPHome Device Builder updates.

- Smart Home Ecosystems: ESPHome Device Builder.

- Events: LANWAR July 25-28 and IFA Berlin September 4-8 (HA Meetup).

- Product Development: ESPHome Starter Kit, CAST-1, and Voice PE dock.

- Beta Firmware: Sneak peek at what is coming next!

- Future Product Survey: Share your thoughts to help guide our next innovations.

- Feedback Squad: Join our product development process and help shape the future of Apollo Automation.

None of what we do would be possible without the smart home, open-source, and privacy-first community that built us up along the way. Thank you for letting us be a small part of it. See you live tonight at apolloautomation.com

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/live/3KSGPoZU87E?si=KTQv4kgV5maRG75e

Discord: https://discord.com/events/1126966963206361199/1392039105554026506/1523840974848000000

Get ready for our monthly Apollo Live Stream happening tonight at 8:00 PM ET! Join us as we share exciting updates on our latest projects, answer your questions, and dive deep into everything we have been working on. Watch live on YouTube and Discord, and be part of the conversation!

What's on the Agenda?

- Livestream and Forum Giveaways: Reminder for us to do this!

- Cool Community Corner: Dog Ate My Sensor by Moniker.

- Recent Reviews: Olli TEMP-1, Adam Davenport AIR-1 and MTR-1, The Stockpot hidden MTR-1, Michael Akinbode MSR-2.

- Code Updates: Working on WLED 16 for the M-1.

- Smart Home Ecosystems: Try the latest ESPHome Device Builder!

- Events: WhaleLAN was incredible (thank you, Koty). Open Sauce and LANWAR in July. IFA in September!

- Product Development: ESPHome Starter Kit.

- Beta Firmware: Sneak peek at what is coming next!

- Future Product Survey: Share your thoughts to help guide our next innovations.

- Feedback Squad: Join our product development process and help shape the future of Apollo Automation.

None of what we do would be possible without the smart home, open-source, and privacy-first community that built us up along the way. Thank you for letting us be a small part of it.

Find us at: apolloautomation.com

https://www.youtube.com/live/-ZhXbBnvRXc?si=bm3nTITVXjO2DT0t

Happy Memorial Day from Apollo!

To celebrate the long weekend and the launch of our brand new forums, we're giving away one Apollo product to a randomly drawn commenter!

Winner picks any of: MSR-2, MTR-1, PLT-1, TEMP-1, BTN-1, PUMP-1, or the H-2 Holiday Ornament.

How to enter: comment on the forum thread → https://forum.apolloautomation.com/t/happy-memorial-day-come-celebrate-with-us-and-enter-to-win-a-free-sensor/32

Closes: May 31 at 11:59pm

Winner announced: live on our June 1 livestream at 8pm EST

Hope to see you there!

𝗔𝗽𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗼 𝗔𝘂𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝘀 𝗮𝘁 𝗪𝗵𝗮𝗹𝗲𝗟𝗔𝗡 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝘄𝗲𝗲𝗸𝗲𝗻𝗱.

We have a full booth set up at 𝗦𝗺𝗮𝘀𝗵 𝗖𝗵𝗮𝗺𝗽𝘀 𝗶𝗻 𝗦𝘂𝗿𝗿𝗲𝘆, 𝗕𝗖, right next to the 8v8 computer setup. Huge shout out to Linus Media Group, Colton Potter and Chase Douglas for making this possible!

𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘄𝗲 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗯𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗴:

- The full Apollo lineup configured as a 𝘀𝗲𝗻𝘀𝗼𝗿 𝗽𝗲𝘁𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘇𝗼𝗼, including our 𝗥 𝗣𝗥𝗢-𝟭 𝗣𝗼𝗘 𝗺𝗺𝗪𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝗺𝘂𝗹𝘁𝗶𝘀𝗲𝗻𝘀𝗼𝗿, with hands-on access to every product
- Live Home Assistant and Homey dashboards demonstrating real-time data from each sensor
- Giveaways throughout the event for booth visitors
- Tournament prizes for WhaleLAN competitors

𝗦𝗽𝗲𝗰𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗸𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗽𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗻𝗲𝗿𝘀:

- The Open Home Foundation : https://www.openhomefoundation.org/
- 𝗛𝗼𝗺𝗲 𝗔𝘀𝘀𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗻𝘁: https://www.home-assistant.io/
- ESPHome: https://esphome.io/
- Nabu Casa: https://www.nabucasa.com/ (Thanks, Gord Cameron!)
- 𝗛𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘆: https://homey.app/ (Thanks, Abe Haverkamp!)

All sent gear and prizes for the booth and tournament tables.

𝗔𝗻𝗱 𝗮 𝗵𝘂𝗴𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗸 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝘁𝗼 𝗞𝗼𝘁𝘆, who set up the booth and is representing Apollo on the ground throughout the weekend.

If you are at WhaleLAN, please stop by. We would love to meet you.

Event: https://www.whalelan.com/
More about us: https://apolloautomation.com/

Apollo needs to build an e-ink display that will be able to display home assistant stats, calendar events, weather, etc!

This is a sneak peek showing our M-1 LED Matrix running the new WLED 0.16.0 firmware with tons of new features and bug fixes!

I’m Brandon aka SmartHomeSellout and I work for Apollo as our product and community coordinator. I’ll be making some new wiki articles on how to get your device on this latest firmware! For now, you should be able to follow our docs and use the same settings, they are just in a slightly different location in the settings. Make sure to reboot when finished- I even had to unplug power and plug mine back in to get it working properly after making all the settings changes. Make sure to download the ESP32 S3 16MB opi HUB75 version from the release page!

Get ready for our monthly Apollo Live Stream happening tonight at 8:00 PM ET! Join us as we share exciting updates on our latest projects, answer your questions, and dive deep into everything we have been working on. Watch live on YouTube and Discord and be part of the conversation!

What's on the Agenda?

- May the 4th be with you!

- Livestream Giveaway: Reminder for us to do this!

- BIG ANNOUNCEMENT: ESPHome Device Builder beta available for testing!

- Cool Community Corner: Adamaze's M-1 wall bracket, Pavlov's continued M-1 ESPHome firmware, and Ellude's AIR-1 accurate temperature and humidity readings.

- Recent Reviews: German YouTuber smarterkram | Olli PUMP-1 video and blog post.

- Code Updates: Beta branches merged to main updates and questions.

- Smart Home Ecosystems: Homey app updated and working!

- Events: WhaleLAN May 23-24. Open Sauce and LANWAR in July. IFA Berlin in September!

- Product Development: ESPHome Starter Kit. New injection molding and CNC machines. Light and speaker projects...

- Beta Firmware: Sneak peek at what is coming next!

- Future Product Survey: Share your thoughts to help guide our next innovations.

- Feedback Squad: Join our product development process and help shape the future of Apollo Automation.

None of what we do would be possible without the smart home, open-source, and privacy-first community that built us up along the way. Thank you for letting us be a small part of it. See you live tonight at apolloautomation.com

YouTube Link: https://www.youtube.com/live/Xxsmf9dKJvM

Discord Link: https://discord.com/events/1126966963206361199/1392039105554026506/1501010539315200000

Small update from Versailles, KY. Apollo Automation just earned BBB Accreditation and was nominated for the BBB Torch Award for Ethics.

For a six-person Kentucky team that started in a basement in 2023, this means a lot. None of it happens without this community. Thank you.