Aqara Cube T1 Pro, REQUIRES AQARA ZIGBEE 3.0 HUB, 6 Sides to Control Different Scenes and Diverse Actions to Control Smart Home Devices, Supports Homekit, Alexa and IFTTT

Great device, connects to Home Assistant compatible. Slight hiccups getting it sorted originally, but usual steps of repairing and such resolved these. Mostly got it as a gimmick for a family member who likes this stuff, but found they're really into pushing it to its limits Got a whole range of functions assigned already.

I think the biggest improvement over the previous version is addition of the dice-like dots printed on each face of the cube. You could never be sure which face was where before. It's a shame that you must choose between Automation mode and Scene mode which limits functionality a bit but if you already have an Aqara hub this is cheap enough to justify trying it.

Even when this does work, not very often, it's slow as hell. It's certainly not precise enough to use for anything decent. The aqara app is just as bad. It's supposed to have two different modes, but trying to get the cube to swap modes is a complete nightmare. Neither of the modes work well enough to be worth thr hassle. Do yourself a favour and use NFC tags instead. It's cheapet, they work perfectly, and you don't need to worry about the batteries running out :)

It took lots of juggling to get this to work with Home Assistant but got there in the end with the help of a Blueprint. It only seems to work reasonably when on a hard flat surface and it has to be tapped over when flipping it. The knock feature is very hit and miss and yet should be the most useful as it would be suited to switching sources on an amplifier, for example.

Took a few goes to pair it fully. X5 presses on the reset moves it to action setting. Info on the web. So far I have 6 different lighting scenes, tap to turn on fan, shake to open curtains. It’s novel and is totally in the spirit of home automation and fun!

It only works on very hard surfaces and even then it's jñhit and miss. You have to keep retrying the cube side to get it to work. The rotate feature is also ropey. Sometimes it works then it doesn't. It also only works on some surfaces. It won't work in your hand.

this kind of stuff is what makes zigbee nonsense just fab. I don't use it with the branded hub and I did find it dependent on hub compatibility as almost every other function-rich zigbee thing on a zigbee net does, it's a common issue and a genuine bugbear with lots of zigbee things. it's unfair to single this one out over what may be proprietary issues. Perhaps it's got too many switches which everyone has to use [I forgot almost all of them] so as to get full value for money or whatever but it's just great. it's just fun. I deployed shake to switch on my reading lights. That's all. It does nothing else. I am wasting all the other functions. Every time I switch on my reading lights with a shake it just makes me smile. Worth every penny!

This cube is one of my more unusual yolo purchases. It works fine with Home Assistant, personally I have mine paired via Zigbee2Mqtt and you require a blueprint to unlock the full functionality of it. Apparently it works via ZHA, however I have not explored that option. The combinations you can assign to this weird cube are huge. I have mine configured so I have to rotate it to the desired face, then bang it on the desk twice else you risk it triggering all sorts of automations when it detects motion. Be mindful that it's a battery powered zigbee device that will go to sleep when set down, so it usually requires a little movement to wake up. The cube is not perfect and the actions can take practise, however once you have them down and providing you make allowances for it, it's a fun product and definitely starts a conversation when guests see it on the coffee table. If you're willing to get busy with a label maker and a craft knife, you can make it look quite cool.