Home Assistant Connect Aux-2 smart home multi-tool
Hands-on review of the $69 Home Assistant Connect Aux-2, a compact smart home hub designed to bridge Bluetooth and control audio devices.
Stock photo for illustration only, not from the actual event
- Nabu Casa launched the Home Assistant Connect Aux-2 priced at $69
- The deck-of-cards-sized box features Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Ethernet, and serial ports
- Helps solve fridge temperature tracking issues and in-wall speaker setups
- Built on ESPHome and leverages existing Home Assistant integrations
Nabu Casa, the commercial arm of the Open Home Foundation, has released the Home Assistant Connect Aux-2, a multi-function device designed to bring more gadgets into your smart home ecosystem. This release aligns with Home Assistant's ongoing efforts to become significantly more user-friendly.
Nathan Edwards, Senior Reviews Editor at The Verge, tested the Aux-2 for a couple of days and found it remarkably useful and surprisingly straightforward to set up. Priced at $69, the box is approximately the size of a standard deck of cards.
Stock photo for illustration only, not from the actual event
The compact hardware packs a wide array of connectivity options, including:
- 2.4GHz Wi-Fi and Bluetooth
- Ethernet, USB-A, and USB-C ports
- Digital and analog audio jacks
- A Grove port for peripherals like sensors, buttons, and LEDs
- A pair of RS-232 serial ports
The device bridges Bluetooth peripherals directly into your Home Assistant setup and features a USB port to plug in a Nabu Casa Z-Wave or Zigbee antenna if your main hub is placed poorly. It also controls hardware like TVs, AV receivers, and solar inverters via serial connection, while letting you plug in an amplifier or powered speakers through the audio jack.
All of these capabilities leverage Home Assistant's open-source architecture. The Aux-2 is based on ESPHome, an open platform for building DIY smart home gear from affordable ESP boards, utilizing existing integrations for all its features.
The introduction of a dedicated hardware multi-tool like the Aux-2 highlights Nabu Casa's push to lower the barrier to entry for mainstream users. By packaging complex features like Bluetooth proxies and serial communication into a plug-and-play device, they bridge the gap between advanced open-source automation and everyday convenience.
The reviewer noted that the Aux-2 directly addressed two long-pending household projects. First, monitoring a garage fridge in Texas to ensure the door isn't left open by children, replacing a finicky setup of Aqara Zigbee sensors with Govee Bluetooth hygrometers via the Aux-2's built-in Bluetooth proxy feature.
The second project involved powering a set of unused in-wall speakers in the living room. Setup involved plugging the device into a computer via USB-C to install the latest firmware straight from a browser, configuring Wi-Fi credentials, and moving it to the media console for final configuration within the Home Assistant interface.
Source: The Verge
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