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Tag: home assistant automation

  • TADO API Limits: Home Assistant Users Should Be Concerned

    TADO has introduced strict new API limits that will seriously impact anyone integrating their smart heating system with Home Assistant or other automation platforms.

    Screenshot 2025-09-05 at 10.07.35

    For years, smart home enthusiasts have relied on TADO’s API for near real-time heating and hot water control. But with the recent changes, users are now restricted to just 100 API calls per day unless they pay for a subscription.

    TADO API Limits Explained

    TADO has reduced the default polling frequency of their home assistant integration to every 15 minutes, which works out to roughly 100 calls per day (their new API limit). That may sound reasonable at first glance, but in a smart home environment, it’s far from enough.

    Automations such as pre-heating rooms, adjusting heating when doors and windows are open, or monitoring hot water require near real-time updates. Waiting up to 15 minutes for an update simply breaks the purpose of automation.

    TADO now offers a paid subscription (currently $29.99 per year) to increase limits to 20,000 calls per day. While not expensive in isolation, it feels like a hidden cost on top of the hundreds of pounds many of us have already invested in TADO hardware, and a bit of a rug pull / bait and switch.

    Local API Access Through HomeKit

    TADO’s official “alternative” is to use local access via HomeKit on V3+ bridges (or Matter on Tado X). But this approach has serious drawbacks:

    • Requires additional Apple hardware like an Apple TV or HomePod to act as a hub on V3+.
    • No hot water support. Local access covers TRVs, temperature, and humidity – but not hot water control.

    For many households, hot water is just as important as heating. Limiting its control to cloud-only updates every 15 minutes makes the system feel incomplete.

    TADO Integration Problems in Home Assistant

    Home Assistant users face another major issue: the TADO integration is unstable. Sessions frequently log out at random, breaking automations and leaving users without reliable control.

    The integration is community-maintained, not officially developed by TADO, and the company shows little interest in fixing these problems. It leaves power users caught between unreliable cloud access and incomplete local control.

    TADO X and Matter Support

    TADO’s latest hardware, TADO X, includes Matter support – a promising step towards local integration without needing Apple’s HomeKit ecosystem.

    But once again, there’s a catch: no hot water support. And so far, TADO has made no public commitment to add it in future.

    For many, this undermines Matter’s potential to finally deliver reliable, subscription-free local access.

    Why This Matters for Smart Home Owners

    The whole point of a smart heating system is flexibility and integration. TADO’s decision to restrict API access feels like a step backwards:

    • It penalises the most engaged users who automate beyond TADO’s app.
    • It introduces unnecessary subscription costs.
    • It limits functionality by excluding hot water from local integrations.

    Rather than blaming users for “overusing” the API, TADO should re-evaluate its infrastructure. A well-designed API can scale. Instead, customers are left with broken integrations, missing features, and a sense that they’re being upsold to fix problems they didn’t create.

    Final Thoughts

    As someone who has spent over £700 on TADO hardware, I find these changes disappointing. Smart home enthusiasts chose TADO because it promised openness, flexibility, and control. Now, that vision feels compromised.

    Until TADO re-thinks its approach, many Home Assistant users may start looking elsewhere for heating solutions that truly embrace the principles of the smart home.

  • Using WeatherFlow Tempest to Warm My Tesla for the School Run

    As a parent juggling the school run every morning, there’s one thing I really don’t enjoy – scraping ice off the car while trying to wrangle two teenagers and get out the door on time. So I’ve automated the process of pre-heating and defrosting my Tesla using my WeatherFlow Tempest weather station and Home Assistant.

    Tesla being heated

    WeatherFlow Tempest is a smart weather station that gives me highly accurate outdoor temperature data from my own garden. More accurate, in fact, than the Tesla’s own temperature sensors when the car is asleep.

    I use the Tessie integration in Home Assistant to communicate with my car. It allows me to send commands like “turn on climate control” even when the Tesla is sleeping, without the delay or failure that sometimes occurs with the native Tesla integration.

    Why Use Tempest Instead of Tesla’s Own Temperature Reading?

    Tesla goes into a deep sleep mode overnight to conserve energy. That’s great for battery life, but not so great if you want reliable temperature data in the early morning. The external temperature reported by the car can be outdated or missing altogether until the car is awake and responsive.

    Instead, I rely on my WeatherFlow Tempest’s temperature sensor, which continues to report accurate live data overnight.

    The Automation Setup

    Every weekday morning at exactly 8.00am, my Home Assistant instance checks the current outside temperature reported by the Tempest. If it’s below 3°C, the automation triggers Tessie to enable climate control in the car for 15 minutes – enough to warm the cabin and defrost the windows. I also make sure I only set this on school days.

    I also receive a notification letting me know that the defrost has been enabled.

    Here’s the automation in full:

    alias: Warm Car Automation
description: At 08.00 every school day check outside temp and defrost if below 3C
mode: single
triggers:
  - at: "08:00:00"
    platform: time
conditions:
  - condition: time
    weekday:
      - mon
      - tue
      - wed
      - thu
      - fri
  - condition: numeric_state
    entity_id: sensor.tempest_temperature
    below: 3
actions:
  - service: climate.turn_on
    target:
      entity_id: climate.none_climate
  - service: notify.notify
    data:
      message: "Car Defrost Enabled for 15 mins"
  - service: notify.persistent_notification
    data:
      title: "Car Defrost Enabled"
      message: "Car Defrost Enabled for 15 mins"

    You can take this further by:

    • Tracking how often the automation is triggered using a counter or helper.
    • Adding a secondary check for battery level to avoid defrosting if your range is low.
    • Turning the climate off again after a set duration (or allowing Tesla’s own timeout to do it for you).

    This small quality-of-life improvement saves me time and hassle every winter morning, and it’s yet another example of how Home Assistant can bring together multiple smart devices into a seamless routine.