📅 Published: June 2026 | ✍️ By Brad Andrews | ⏱️ 14 min read
Prime day is often a great time to grab a deal on something you already have been thinking of for a while. However someones inspiration might leave you stuck, which is why I put together a quick list of big impact products you should consider adding and how to use them too.
I use everything on the list daily in my home and they all come with a higher than usual spouse approval factor too! Some of these items I have been running for several years and some shorter, but the focus on this list is what I would without a doubt use again and obviously what I recommend you consider too.
So here is the list along with bonus yaml on what to do with them too, all from my setup just with placeholders for you to fill in your entity IDs and unique information.
1. Inovelli Red Series Switches – VZW31-SN and VZW32-SN
Z-Wave switches are the backbone of my entire lighting setup, and Inovelli is the brand I’ve standardized toward as I replace older switches room by room.
There are two models worth knowing here. The VZW31-SN is the standard Red Series dimmer. The VZW32-SN adds built-in mmWave presence sensing, which means the switch itself can tell when a room is occupied without any separate motion sensor.
Both have the customizable LED bar running down the side of the switch, which is more useful than it sounds. You can set it to any colour, and that colour can change based on conditions in your home.
I put the mmWave version in both of my kids’ rooms. Each one gets the LED bar set to their own colour, lights turn off automatically a few minutes after the room reads empty, and double-tapping the switch controls their Govee table lamp without touching a phone or a voice assistant. For a kid’s room, that combination of “it just works” and “it’s clearly theirs” goes a long way.
Example automation: Auto-off with LED bar colour per room
yaml
alias: KIDS_ROOM_1 - mmWave Auto-Off and LED Colour
description: >
When the mmWave presence sensor on the VZW32-SN reports the room is
unoccupied for 5 minutes, turn off the light. Sets the LED bar to a
custom colour any time the light is on.
mode: single
trigger:
- platform: state
entity_id: binary_sensor.YOUR_KIDS_ROOM_PRESENCE
to: "off"
for:
minutes: 5
action:
- action: light.turn_off
target:
entity_id: light.YOUR_KIDS_ROOM_LIGHT
- action: light.turn_on
data:
rgb_color: [0, 194, 255]
brightness: 40
target:
entity_id: light.YOUR_KIDS_ROOM_LIGHT_LED_BARReplace YOUR_KIDS_ROOM_PRESENCE with the mmWave occupancy entity created automatically when you pair the VZW32-SN through Z-Wave JS. Replace YOUR_KIDS_ROOM_LIGHT and YOUR_KIDS_ROOM_LIGHT_LED_BAR with your actual switch and LED notification entities, both found under Settings → Devices & Services → Z-Wave.
Affiliate link: Inovelli VZW32-SN mmWave Dimmer Affiliate link: Inovelli VZW31-SN Dimmer
2. Yale Assure Lock 2 – YRD430 (Deadbolt) and YRL226 (Lever)
Every exterior door in my house is a Yale, and I’ve landed firmly on Z-Wave as the protocol I trust most after years of testing different approaches. It’s consistently the most reliable option I’ve run.
The YRD430 is the deadbolt I use on exterior doors, and the newer ones support fingerprint unlock. The YRL226 lever version is what I use on interior doors, including my home gym. Setup requires creating a Yale cloud account initially, which is a strange ask for a lock that’s otherwise fully local, but once that one-time setup finishes, everything after that runs on Z-Wave with no cloud dependency.
The detail that changed how I use these locks is that they don’t just report “unlocked.” They report which user code unlocked the door, and whether it was unlocked by a keypad code or by turning the deadbolt by hand from inside. That direction-of-travel detail tells Home Assistant whether someone is arriving or leaving.
I use this constantly on my kitchen back door, where a specific user unlocking it triggers backyard lighting automatically. But the automation I actually rely on most is in my home gym, where the lock identifies which one of us walked in and personalizes the entire session.
Example automation: Gym door identifies who walked in
yaml
alias: GYM_DOOR - Identify User on Unlock
description: >
When the gym door lock is unlocked using a specific user's keypad code,
set the active user across all gym tracking helpers, turn on the gym
light, and run the personalized welcome script for that person.
mode: single
trigger:
- platform: state
entity_id: event.YOUR_GYM_DOOR_CODE_SLOT_1
id: user_one
- platform: state
entity_id: event.YOUR_GYM_DOOR_CODE_SLOT_2
id: user_two
action:
- choose:
- conditions:
- condition: trigger
id: user_one
sequence:
- action: input_text.set_value
target:
entity_id: input_text.YOUR_GYM_ACTIVE_USER
data:
value: "001"
- action: light.turn_on
target:
entity_id: light.YOUR_GYM_LIGHT
- action: script.turn_on
target:
entity_id: script.YOUR_GYM_WELCOME_SCRIPT
- conditions:
- condition: trigger
id: user_two
sequence:
- action: input_text.set_value
target:
entity_id: input_text.YOUR_GYM_ACTIVE_USER
data:
value: "002"
- action: light.turn_on
target:
entity_id: light.YOUR_GYM_LIGHT
- action: script.turn_on
target:
entity_id: script.YOUR_GYM_WELCOME_SCRIPTReplace YOUR_GYM_DOOR_CODE_SLOT_1 and _SLOT_2 with the event entities your Yale lock creates for each keypad code slot, found under the lock’s device page in Settings → Devices & Services. Replace YOUR_GYM_ACTIVE_USER, YOUR_GYM_LIGHT, and YOUR_GYM_WELCOME_SCRIPT with your own helper, light, and script entities.
A practical note while you’re at it: I run Panasonic Eneloop rechargeable batteries in every Yale lock. They cost more upfront than standard alkalines but last 6 to 8 months per charge for me, and I’ve stopped thinking about lock batteries entirely since switching.
Affiliate link: Yale Assure Lock 2 YRD430 Affiliate link: Yale Assure Lock 2 Lever YRL226 Affiliate link: Panasonic Eneloop Rechargeable Batteries
3. UniFi G4 Doorbell Pro
Most people install a doorbell camera and stop at the notification. Mine is one of four UniFi Protect cameras feeding directly into Home Assistant, and the doorbell specifically handles package detection, ring alerts, and visitor snapshots, all locally with no subscription.
The local part matters more than it sounds like it should. There’s no cloud relay between the camera detecting something and Home Assistant reacting to it, so announcements and notifications fire in under a second. Once you’ve used a fully local camera setup, the lag on cloud-dependent doorbells becomes obvious.
The detection categories surface as their own binary sensors. Person, package, animal, vehicle. Each one is something you can build on.
Example automation: Rich doorbell notification with live snapshot
yaml
alias: DOORBELL - Notify with Live Snapshot
description: >
When the doorbell is pressed, sends a push notification with a live
camera snapshot attached using entity_id (not a saved file), so the
image is as current as possible when it arrives.
mode: single
trigger:
- platform: state
entity_id: binary_sensor.YOUR_DOORBELL_BUTTON
to: "on"
action:
- action: notify.mobile_app_YOUR_PHONE
data:
title: "Someone's at the door"
message: "The doorbell just rang"
data:
entity_id: camera.YOUR_DOORBELL_CAMERAReplace YOUR_DOORBELL_BUTTON with your doorbell’s ring binary sensor and YOUR_DOORBELL_CAMERA with the camera entity, both found under the UniFi Protect integration in Settings → Devices & Services. The entity_id field in the notification data tells the companion app to fetch the image live from your local instance rather than relying on a saved file.
I’ve gone deeper on what these cameras can actually do in a separate writeup if you want the full set of automations I’ve built around mine.
Affiliate link: UniFi G4 Doorbell Pro
4. Nanoleaf Essentials Downlights and 4D TV Sync
I run 16 Nanoleaf Essentials Downlights through Matter across my media room, lounge, and basement hallway, plus a single Nanoleaf 4D panel syncing lighting to whatever’s on my media room TV.
I want to be straightforward about Matter here, because most coverage of it isn’t. Initial setup is genuinely easier than older protocols. But in my experience, Matter devices are sometimes slow to respond, and they occasionally drop off the network without an obvious cause, needing a power cycle or a repair through the app to come back. The downlights have improved noticeably since I first installed them. The most common quirk left is that right after a power outage, they can come back out of sync with each other, one turning off instantly while the others lag a few seconds behind. Give them a few hours of uptime and they settle down and behave normally.
The 4D panel itself works well for ambient TV lighting. My only real complaint has nothing to do with the electronics. The adhesive Nanoleaf includes to mount it on the back of the TV is weak and it will eventually let go. I ended up using my own double-sided mounting tape to make it stay permanently, and I’d recommend just planning for that from the start rather than finding out the hard way.
Example automation: Dim downlights and sync 4D when a movie starts
yaml
alias: MEDIA_ROOM - Movie Mode Lighting
description: >
When the media room TV switches to a movie/streaming app, dim the
Nanoleaf downlights and turn on 4D ambient TV sync.
mode: single
trigger:
- platform: state
entity_id: media_player.YOUR_MEDIA_ROOM_TV
to: "playing"
action:
- action: light.turn_on
data:
brightness: 40
target:
entity_id: light.YOUR_NANOLEAF_DOWNLIGHTS
- action: switch.turn_on
target:
entity_id: switch.YOUR_NANOLEAF_4D_SYNCReplace YOUR_MEDIA_ROOM_TV with your TV or media player entity, and YOUR_NANOLEAF_DOWNLIGHTS and YOUR_NANOLEAF_4D_SYNC with your Nanoleaf entities under Settings → Devices & Services → Matter.
Affiliate link: Nanoleaf Essentials Downlights Affiliate link: Nanoleaf 4D TV Sync
5. Govee Smart Lamps – Uplighter, Table Lamp, and Edison Bulbs
In my experience, Govee has consistently outperformed Nanoleaf for Home Assistant specifically, but only if you pick models that support the local LAN API rather than relying on Matter or the cloud.
I run the Govee Uplighter Floor Lamp in my office, which gives a tri-zone ripple lighting effect that looks genuinely impressive on a wall. Alongside it I have the Govee Aura table lamp, one in my office and one in each of my kids’ rooms. I’ve also added Govee’s Edison-style smart bulbs in my office and the kids’ playroom, since those are fixtures where the bulb itself is visible, and the filament look suits that kind of fixture far better than a plain bulb would.
One setup tip that will save you a headache: once your Govee device connects to your network, go into your router and assign it a static IP address. If the device’s IP changes later, Home Assistant’s local integration loses track of it until you re-add it, and giving it a fixed address up front avoids that entirely.
I’ll also be honest that the Edison bulbs, which I’ve only been running for three or four months, have needed repairing twice out of four bulbs in that time. That’s been a Matter-related hiccup more than a Govee-specific one, since I’ve seen the same pattern with other Matter devices, but it’s worth knowing going in. Govee’s support has been fast when I’ve needed it, noticeably faster than my experience with Nanoleaf on a similar issue.
The combination I like best in my kids’ rooms is the Inovelli switch and the Govee lamp working together. The wall switch handles overhead lighting and presence, and a double-tap on that same switch turns their lamp on or off, no app required.
alias: KIDS_ROOM_1 - Double Tap Switch Controls Lamp
description: >
Double-tapping the up paddle on the kids' room Inovelli switch toggles
their Govee table lamp on, independent of the overhead light.
mode: single
trigger:
- platform: event
event_type: zwave_js_value_notification
event_data:
entity_id: YOUR_KIDS_ROOM_SWITCH_ID
value: "KeyPressed2x"
property_key_name: "001"
action:
- action: light.turn_on
target:
entity_id: light.YOUR_KIDS_ROOM_GOVEE_LAMPReplace YOUR_KIDS_ROOM_SWITCH_ID with your Inovelli switch’s device entity ID, and YOUR_KIDS_ROOM_GOVEE_LAMP with the Govee lamp entity created by the Govee Lights Local integration.
Affiliate link: Govee Uplighter Floor Lamp (H60B0) Affiliate link: Govee Aura Table Lamp (H6022) Affiliate link: Govee Edison Smart Bulbs
6. Sonos
Sonos had a rough patch with their app a couple of years back. I had to fully delete and reset up my basement soundbar, subwoofer, and amp during that period, which was frustrating at the time. Since then, I’ve had zero issues. I’m now running six Sonos Amps, two Arc soundbars, two Beam soundbars, and an Era 100 across the house, and they integrate cleanly with both Home Assistant and Music Assistant.
The honest downside is price. This isn’t a budget category, and it never will be.
If you’re starting from scratch and budget matters more than convenience, there are real alternatives. A Raspberry Pi running an amp through Sendspin gives you a tinkerer’s path at a fraction of the cost, if you’re willing to build and maintain it yourself. A middle ground I’d point most people toward is Home Assistant Voice PE or Satellite1 hardware, with the microphone muted and the unit used purely as a speaker on a multi-zone amp setup similar to what Chromecast Audio used to provide. If local voice control on its own interests you, I covered ditching Google Home for local voice in detail in the Blueprint series.
If you want something that works perfectly out of the box with excellent sync and audio quality and you don’t mind paying for that, Sonos is what I’d recommend without hesitation. If you like to tinker and build things yourself, the Pi and amp path will get you most of the way there for less money and more weekends.
Example automation: Announce doorbell on the nearest occupied Sonos zone
yaml
alias: SONOS - Doorbell Announcement on Occupied Zones
description: >
Plays a doorbell chime through whichever Sonos speakers are in rooms
currently occupied, rather than every speaker in the house at once.
mode: parallel
trigger:
- platform: state
entity_id: binary_sensor.YOUR_DOORBELL_BUTTON
to: "on"
action:
- action: media_player.play_media
data:
media_content_id: media-source://tts/YOUR_CHIME_SOUND
media_content_type: music
target:
entity_id: "{{ states.media_player | selectattr('attributes.YOUR_ROOM_OCCUPIED_ATTRIBUTE', 'eq', true) | map(attribute='entity_id') | list }}"Replace YOUR_DOORBELL_BUTTON with your doorbell sensor and YOUR_CHIME_SOUND with a media source of your choice. The room-occupancy filter depends on how you’ve structured presence sensing in your own setup, so treat this as a starting template rather than a drop-in.
Affiliate link: Sonos Era 100 Affiliate link: Sonos Beam Affiliate link: Sonos Amp
7. Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 FE+ (and Tab A11+ for fixed mounts)
My main dashboard tablet replaced Google Home displays entirely, running Fully Kiosk Browser pointed at my Home Assistant dashboard. I chose the Tab S9 FE+ specifically because performance and microphone quality both matter here. It’s fast enough to double as a travel tablet for the kids when we’re not using it as a wall display, so it needs to hold up to more than just sitting in a dock all day.
For tablets that are always going to stay docked and never travel, the cheaper Tab A11+ works fine and the extra RAM over the older A9 helps it stay responsive, though it’s still a notch below the FE+ in everyday speed.
One detail that doesn’t get mentioned enough in tablet buying guides: Samsung’s battery management settings let you cap charging at 80%, which meaningfully extends the life of a tablet that’s plugged in 24/7. For something sitting in a wall dock permanently, that’s a real feature, not a nice-to-have. I’d rather pay a bit more for a known brand with that kind of battery control built in than save money on something that degrades faster sitting on a charger forever.
Down the road, I’m looking at something closer to an Apolosign-style smart display, which shows artwork passively and becomes a dashboard on walk-up. That’s not where I am yet, but it’s the direction I expect dashboard hardware to go.
Example automation: Wake dashboard tablet on motion
yaml
alias: KITCHEN_TABLET - Wake on Motion
description: >
Wakes the kitchen dashboard tablet's screen when motion is detected in
the kitchen, using the Fully Kiosk Browser integration.
mode: single
trigger:
- platform: state
entity_id: binary_sensor.YOUR_KITCHEN_MOTION
to: "on"
action:
- action: button.press
target:
entity_id: button.YOUR_KITCHEN_TABLET_SCREEN_ONReplace YOUR_KITCHEN_MOTION with your kitchen motion sensor and YOUR_KITCHEN_TABLET_SCREEN_ON with the screen-on button entity exposed by the Fully Kiosk Browser integration once it’s connected to Home Assistant.
Affiliate link: Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 FE+ Affiliate link: Samsung Galaxy Tab A11+
8. Aeotec Home Energy Meter Gen 5
I’ll set expectations honestly on this one. Installing an Aeotec Home Energy Meter is not an overnight win. You install it, and then you wait a month or two before the data actually tells you anything useful. There’s nothing flashy about a clamp sensor on your electrical panel.
What it’s good for is catching anomalies you wouldn’t otherwise notice. I picked up a Dyson heating fan for my basement, and within the first couple of weeks of using it, the energy dashboard showed a spike that was clearly tied to that fan running. Once I saw what it was actually costing me per month in hydro, I scaled back how often I used it.
If you’re looking for something exciting to install this Prime Day, this probably isn’t it. But if you’re trying to figure out where your power budget is actually going, and maybe free up some money to spend on the flashier stuff later, this is the one that quietly pays for itself first.
Installation involves clamping current sensors around the main feed wires in your electrical panel. If you’re confident around a breaker panel and comfortable following a clear wiring diagram, it’s a manageable DIY project. If you have any hesitation working inside a live panel, this is worth having an electrician handle.
Example automation: Alert on unusual energy spike
yaml
alias: ENERGY - High Usage Alert
description: >
Notifies when whole-home power draw exceeds a threshold that's
unusual for typical daily use, helping catch a device left running
or pulling more than expected.
mode: single
trigger:
- platform: numeric_state
entity_id: sensor.YOUR_HOME_ENERGY_METER_POWER
above: 5000
for:
minutes: 10
action:
- action: notify.mobile_app_YOUR_PHONE
data:
title: "Unusual power draw detected"
message: "Home is pulling more power than usual. Worth checking what's running."Replace YOUR_HOME_ENERGY_METER_POWER with your Aeotec power sensor entity, found under Settings → Devices & Services → Z-Wave. The 5000-watt threshold is just a starting point. Watch your own dashboard for a couple of weeks first to find a number that’s actually unusual for your home.
Affiliate link: Aeotec Home Energy Meter Gen 5
9. Home Assistant Green or a Beelink Mini PC
This is less a single product pick and more a fork in the road, and which side you land on depends entirely on what you want your setup to eventually do.
Home Assistant Green is the right starting point for almost everyone. It’s plug and play, officially supported, and backup and restore are simple enough that migrating to bigger hardware later is genuinely painless. If your plan is mostly lights, locks, and basic automations, Green will carry you a long way without ever feeling like a bottleneck.
Where Green runs out of room is local voice processing and camera analysis. Running TTS and STT entirely on-device, or running something like Frigate to do AI-based detection on camera feeds, needs more horsepower than Green is built to provide. That’s where a mini PC like a Beelink comes in. Installing Proxmox as the underlying OS makes it even more flexible, since you can then run Home Assistant alongside other VMs or containers on the same box instead of dedicating an entire machine to just one job.
So the short version: if it’s mostly lights and locks, Green makes sense and you likely won’t outgrow it soon. If you want fully local voice control or camera feeds being analyzed in real time, go with the mini PC route from the start and save yourself a migration later.
If you’re genuinely unsure which one fits what you’re trying to build, reach out and I’m happy to help you figure it out before you spend the money.
Example automation: Migration-friendly backup schedule
yaml
alias: HA - Nightly Backup to NAS
description: >
Runs a full Home Assistant backup every night and stores it on
network storage, making a future hardware migration straightforward
regardless of which platform you start on.
mode: single
trigger:
- platform: time
at: "03:00:00"
action:
- action: backup.create
data:
name: "Nightly Automated Backup"This automation works identically whether you’re running Home Assistant Green or a self-hosted mini PC. Replace the schedule time to suit your own routine, and make sure your backup location, configured separately under Settings → System → Backups, points to network storage rather than the same device running Home Assistant.
Affiliate link: Home Assistant Green Affiliate link: Beelink Mini PC
10. A Good TV Deal (If You Need One)
This one’s a little different from the rest of the list, because the “automation” isn’t really about the TV itself. It’s about what you connect it to.
A TV can work as a view-only dashboard display paired with something like a Raspberry Pi running a browser, or it can be controlled directly through Home Assistant so your lights dim automatically when a movie starts. My own setup uses an Apple TV to handle the smart side of things, but Android TVs also integrate natively with Home Assistant if you’d rather skip an extra box entirely.
Prime Day tends to be one of the better times of year to pick up a TV at a real discount, whether you need a replacement or just want to go bigger. If you’re already building out a media room automation setup, this is a reasonable time to make that move.
If you want ideas for what to actually do with a TV once it’s connected to Home Assistant, the Home Assistant subreddit and the Home Assistant Facebook community are both worth digging through for dashboard ideas and walkthroughs, and I’ll keep adding more of my own here on the blog as I build them out.
Affiliate link: Check today’s TV deals on Amazon
That’s the list. Ten things running in my house right now, not ten things I think would look good in an article.
A few of these I’d buy again without thinking twice. The Yale locks and the Inovelli switches are probably the two I’d replace first if something happened to them tomorrow. A couple, like the Nanoleaf gear, come with real caveats I’m not going to pretend don’t exist, because pretending doesn’t help you spend your money well this Prime Day.
If you end up picking up any of these, or you’re trying to decide between the Green and the mini PC route, drop a comment or send me a message on the Smart Home Secrets Facebook page. I’d genuinely like to know what you’re building.
Smart Home Secrets is reader-supported. We may earn a commission if you buy through our links.