Thought I had this figured out but I found out I don’t:
My desire is to remotely reset my Wyze smart plugs. People have said that they must be physically unplugged then plugged back in to accomplish this.
Well, I thought that if I were to remotely reboot my modem then router it would reset the smart plug. I found out today that it does not.
Is there a way to reset the Wyze smart plug remotely. If I’m away from home I obviously can’t get there to unplug then replug it……Thanks, tlhutch4
Unfortunately, no. The plugs must be removed from the outlet and plugged back in to reset them. If it’s just a network thing, rebooting the router and modem might help, but not guaranteed.
Seems very unfortunate that there would be no way to bring my cameras back online if one of the smart plugs went offline and no one was available to unplug and plug it in to get things up.
There needs to be some way around this to be a useful system in event of a smart plug going offline.
You are focusing on treating the symptoms and not diagnosing the problem.
Why are devices going offline?
I used to have issues with devices going offline regularly, both Wyze devices and Non-Wyze devices.
Non-Wyze smart plugs would regularly drop. Very expensive and highly rated GE smart switches would blink in and out every time I walked by them.
The symptom was that they were going offline. The problem that caused this was that my WiFi network was weak and overloaded. I upgraded to an older model Mesh router and added a WiFi Extender. It was about 80% effective in solving the problem. I was still getting drops on the devices using the extender (not as powerful as the base router, no dedicated backhaul). I recently upgraded again to a powerful dual mesh system and have not seen a dropped device since installing it.
Slabslayer,
Thanks for your input. In my case I “do not” have devices going offline frequently. I just stared keeping track of them and found that I have had just 2 occurrences in 8 days from 2 different devices. Additionally, I have upgraded to an excellent Netgear Orbi router with a satellite.
Two occurrences in a weeks’ time is not terrible, and that’s not my issue. My issue is only that I would like a way to get my smart plugs back online remotely when the drop offline. This is what my smart plugs do for me when camera drop, now I need a way to get the smart plugs back remotely should they do the same even though that might not be frequent…Thanks, tlhutch4
Unlike the cameras, you can’t schedule a reboot of the smart plug either. I have my cameras do a scheduled reboot every night, and that does help, but the outlets don’t have that capability.
In many cases, the answer to the second part is because it’s Wyze. This is a VERY common problem. I have Wyze devices that won’t stay connected when less than 10 feet (in some cases less than 2 feet) from the Access point, and I’m using Meraki enterprise grade APs that can handle many hundreds of simultaneous connections (no where near that many in use), and a commercial grade router that can handle 10s of thousands of simultaneous connections.
KC666,
Thanks, I appreciate your input…tlhutch4
For now, I am going to remove the smart plugs on my “cameras only” as they run continuously and therefore do need schedules or rules.
If the cameras are going offline and no smart plugs are being used, I’ll see if I can I reboot the Modem and Router to get them back online. If so, smart plugs will not be needed on my cameras, but I will continue to use them wherever I have lights that need to operate on a schedule rather than continuous.
tlhutch4
I am not using an Enterprise, Business Class, or Commercial Grade router. I also don’t need hundreds of concurrent IPs or an overly complicated network topology that takes a PhD from MIT to manage. Yet I am experiencing no less than 100% uptime for over 100 devices from 5 different IoT Ecosystems… including 11 Wyze 2021 CFH plugs which have never gone offline and are some of the farthest devices from either of my routers with the lowest RSSI.
My personal use experience, having personally experienced those regular drops on multiple device ecosystems, is that my old routers weren’t getting the job done. My current mesh system is getting it done with spectacular results. And, I have added about a dozen devices since upgrading. My old devices didn’t change, I didn’t move them, I only replaced my previous mesh router and extender with a new mesh router and sattelite. Given that upgrade was the only change made, I am hard pressed to conclude that the Wyze devices you described suddenly stopped being Wyze devices and acting like Wyze devices “because it’s Wyze”.
My advice for using a smart plug to reset a Wyze camera is to use a smart plug that isn’t Wyze. That way if there are Wyze glitches for whatever reason, you have a better chance of rebooting the camera if the plug is another brand and still accessible.
Personally, I have quite a few smart plugs and smart switches from various brands and rarely if ever have any issues of them dropping offline. I have some plugs and switches that have literally been on for years without a single drop except for when my entire network was down for upgrade, power outage, etc. I haven’t had as much luck with Wyze plugs which occasionally get the cloud symbol and go offline so I retired them.
I tried one Wyze smart plug again around Thanksgiving for a single string of Christmas lights in my porch window with a timer rule and it dropped multiple times in just the first week. I gave up and switched it to one of my Smart Life compatible smart plugs and it stayed online with an Alexa routine the rest of the holiday season until I put it away just yesterday. I love the Wyze cameras and the V2 sensors/home monitoring stuff, but switches and bulbs were never reliable enough for me and they also triggered slower from motion sensors than others.
Since I posted this Smart plug question, I’m getting interesting responses both pro and con on using Wyze smart plugs with V3 cameras.
Seems to me that people’s experiences are related to their other devices (modems etc.) as much as the Wyze Smart Plug itself.
Right now, I’m running a trial using my V3 cameras with NO smart plugs to see if they go OFFLINE more or less than when I’m using the Smart Plugs with them.
Additionally, I want to see if I can bring the V3 cameras back online by rebooting my Modem and Router remotely (without smart plugs), remembering that my goal is to get my cameras back online remotely (if I’m out of town). This I was unable to do when the Smart Plugs went offline.
tlhutch4
SlabSlayer,
What is your current mesh router system that is functioning well for you?
My router is a Netgear ORBI RBR 750
Tlhutch4
I have purposely left that bit of data out of my posts for several reasons.
The intent of my posts isn’t to promote any specific brand or model of router. It is to point out that the relationship between the devices and the router is very much dependant on the router. More so in my opinion.
Most users want to believe that their current router is bulletproof because they paid so much for it and it can carry a bajillion devices or because it is a massive hassle to replace it. Just because a user hitches their trailer to a Ferrari doesn’t mean it will pull it.
The quick and easy response trend here in the forum has always been to claim that Wyze devices are the problem. My experience, in my opinion, disproves that assertion. Yes, they do require a very robust network, but so did the other ecosystems I employ that were going offline at a much higher rate before I upgraded.
If a router upgrade fixed the drops on all devices across multiple ecosystems, can it still be called Wyze device issue? If it were a Wyze device issue, only my Wyze devices would have been dropping, they still would be dropping now, and they would be falling off of all networks across the forum… and that isn’t the case.
I monitored the RSSI of my affected devices, the times when they were going offline, the network demand at those times, and the node activity. It was clear that the router was causing the drops trying to switch the device over to the root from the node and not letting it go back. They then lost all semblance of connectivity and went offline. I don’t know if it was outside intereference on the band, some protocol in the router, power supply fluctuations, a combination of all three, or something completely different altogether. I just knew the router was the common denominator, not my Wyze devices.
I didn’t share my router make and model because I don’t want to be the one here to influence a user to go buy a specific router and then have that come back to bite me when it doesn’t work like they want. I made that mistake before and it was not a pleasant exchange.
Routers are like precision tools. Each has its own purpose, design, capabilities, and use case limitations. Mine fits my bandwith needs, coverage area, layout, and client device requirements. That use case will likely only match a small number of other users here.
Like others here, I have 13 Wyze plugs (3 outdoor, and 10 indoor), and in a year, none have ever gone offline, and they run multiple daily schedules.
I also have 20 wyze white bulbs and 4 color wyze bulbs, which have also stayed on and reliable for 6 months so far, and they are on multiple daily schedules as well.
And I have 11 wyze cameras (3-v2, 1-Pan cam v2 and a 1-v3 garage door opener camera mounted indoors, and 6-v3 mounted outdoors), some for 3 + years, and the rest for a year, and all have stayed up and connected for their entire life, except the Pan cam went offline once in its first week, but not since then.
I have 3 wyze climate sensors, 3 leak sensors with remote probes, and a contact sensor, all connected to my wyze v2 sensor hub. in 4 months, they have never gone offline or malfunctioned.
On the other hand, I have a driveway security camera on my alarm system from a well-know/highly respected alarm company, and it constantly complains that the camera has lost its connection (it is the furthest away).
I also have 4 smart plugs, a sprinkler controller and smart thermostat of different brands, that have stayed reliably connected for over a year.
These devices are spread out over the 3 floors of my house, inside and outside. I don’t have a mesh wifi system, but I have one centrally located brand name wifi router.
I am 3000 miles away from these devices, so it is important to me that they stay connected and reliable, and I have not experienced any problems to date.
It really does seem that the connection reliability has to be related to the reliability of the 2.4 GHz wifi that you have, or else I just got lucky and received all good smart devices.
S;abSlayer and B57
You each make very well presented and powerful statements and I thank you for that.
As a follow-up to my situation, I’m finding that I was having occasional Offline status issues with my Smart Plugs with V3 cams connected to them (avg one disconnect per week). I have removed the smart plugs and have not had any disconnects since I did. However, it has only been a few days, so I need more time to evaluate.
Another point is that I have several Wyze Switches and multiple Wyze Plugs with Lights connected and have never had any of them drop offline. My only disconnects were with V3 cameras (5 total).
Thanks…tlhutch4
If you do experience drops in your test, and it is the same device(s) each time, check to see which node had it last and dropped it. Moving the root or sattelite to better serve the device may make a difference.
SlabSlayer,
I will try as you suggested…tlhutch4
I agree with you on the network, or network setup often being the problem. I found that myself back after the V3 cameras came out and an upgrade to my network fixed feed drop issues I was having with them, even though no other devices had any issues with the previous network.
That said, sometimes devices are the problem. This is easily shown as the case when something like a smart plug has too many dropouts however, another version/brand works perfectly fine plugged into the exact same outlet and powering the exact same device.
In the case of Wyze devices, they have gotten better, but I remember many problems with notifications, Alexa routines, etc, that wasn’t really the devices’ fault, but the AWS servers and maybe how Wyze utilizes them. I don’t know if it’s still the case, but when I used Wyze plugs and bulbs, I found them slower to react to triggers, maybe again due to the Amazon Web Servers. For example, I had motion sensors to trigger lights in a room and another brand of smart plug turned on a lamp near instantly, but I would be a few steps into the room before the Wyze plug turned on another light from the same trigger. Currently in that room I have a mix of brands of smart plugs, bulbs, and a motion sensor, and they all trigger at the same time, nearly instantly within one step into the room.
I totally understand and respect your position. There are a lot of variables to the connection issue(s) equation. Glad you seem to have found a good group of hardware that works well for you in your environment.
Call power company ask them to reset power to your house!