YoLink Smart Home Starter Kit: Hub & Water Leak Sensor 4-Pack, SMS/Text, Email & Push Notifications, LoRa Up to 1/4 Mile Open-Air Range, w/Alexa, IFTTT, Home Assistant

9 Feb 2021 Update: Hub & Water Leak Sensors–Great TechSupport. Update 9 Feb 2021. Customer service support, especially from Eric, has been outstanding. Web-based product description has improved greatly and their suite of products continues to expand with interesting new applications for the YoSmart ecosystem. I have alerts set on all of the components of my YoSmart system, and am impressed to see notices come in on email and smartphone when a component exceeds threshold I set (example house humidity), or the hub falls off the network (example, short power outage).The main issue had been Hub would not stay connected on 2.4 GHz channel on WiFi, and so had to operate as an Ethernet hardwired connection. Today Eric suggested I unplug the Ethernet and move the Hub more than 6 feet away from Netgear satellite station, so I moved it 50 feet away. After about 30 minutes, my app showed that Hub was again “Offline”. Perhaps it was offline immediately and just took that long for the update to percolate through the ecosystem and back to my app.***************************************Now that the Hub and Water Leak Sensors are configured, and deployed and Hub is hardwired to home network (NOT WiFi), I give the system 4 stars for intuitiveness of App, functionality during testing (including sending texts and e-mail messages), and connectivity of sensors with Hub. Customer service was also extremely responsive or I would have returned purchase at end of first week. Post-deployment with replaced Sensor and new Hub would be 5 stars if the Hub had not kept dropping off the 2.4 GHz channel on house WiFi, or if I had not planned on using WiFi to begin with.I have given the purchase an overall 3 stars due to problems with initial Hub setup, a sporadic set of water sensor probes on one of the 4 Leak Sensors, unreliability of the WiFi connection on 2.4GHz, and the delay for YoLink to send a new Water Leak Sensor (new one worked fine) and a new Hub (new one would not stay on WiFi 2.4 GHz channel either). Tech support was were responsive, but shipping took a number of days.Tips covered below:* If something doesn’t go like you think it should during initial set up, contact Tech Support ASAP. It’s not worth your time to try and do trouble shooting with a lack of YoLink FAQs and updated useful YouTube demos.* High Marks to Tech Support responsiveness, though the one time I called they answered the phone just saying “Hello” and not identifying themselves as YoLink Tech Support.* The Hub is designed to only ride a 2.4 GHz WiFi channel and that DID NOT work reliably for the Hub or replacement Hub YoLink sent. Mine is now configured via dedicated Ethernet cable to my WiFi satellite station modem. I have seen other reports on YoLink Hub that had the same 2.4 GHz channel problem.* Once Hub was connected to WiFi via Ethernet, connectivity and reporting with Water Leak sensors at the other end of house and in attic was great, showing strong signal strength.* Configure your Hub to send a notice if the Hub goes offline.* Test all your Water Leak Sensors in the environment where you expect them to work, as well as e-mail and phone alerts. I set Alert Interval to 1 minute with both App alert and e-mail. One set of probes did not consistently alert when tested (worked about 20% of time) and I exchanged with YoLink for a new Sensor.* Pay attention to naming conventions of Hub and Sensors. It will not give an error message if you don’t follow the naming convention (which I haven’t found, just trial and error of what was allowed to be saved).* Check for firmware updates for sensors and Hub on the App’s “Detail” page.* I like the battery-low-warning feature, but only time will tell if it actually works as designed as the battery life winds down.- Problems began immediately out of the box. The instructions are by no means complete and there is no place to find out the cause and fix of error messages. A couple of YouTube clips are short and go too quickly to completely understand what feature on the App was touched.- The YoLink HomePage FAQ had no questions, just preformatted form fill information.- The first step, “Binding” the Hub to your App (making it part of your “ecosystem”) produced the following error when I pressed the “Bind Device” bar in App: “Error The device has been bound” . Way too much research to try and figure out what this error meant and how to clear it. Finally I emailed YoLink. I actually got a fairly timely reply. Basically, the devices get bound when being tested before being shipped, and YoLink failed to unbind the device before shipping. So Tech Support “Unbound” the Hub for which I had provided the serial number. Once Tech Support Unbound the Hub from their location, I was able to Bind it into my YoLink ecosystem. Lost a day and a half on that.- On to WiFi connect problems (never resolved with 2.4GHz channel). I have a Netgear Orbi base plus two satellite station router with both a 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz channels and a separate back channel. I have other devices on both channels and none have ever had trouble finding an appropriate usable channel. While the Hub would connect fine using the ethernet connection on the router, it was not my intent to use the last ethernet-connection on the master station for this Hub. When I unplugged the ethernet connection and attempted WiFi, it immediately detected the network name broadcasting and I entered the password. When I attempted to connect, the App eventually errored out with an error notice that said “Connect Faild”. I called Tech Support and they apologized and said I need to do the WiFi set up while it is still connected via ethernet (this is not in the instructions either), admitting that it should connect just fine to the 2.4 GHz channel. I did that, finally connected Hub to WiFi and removed the ethernet connection. Things were fine until I went to test the water sensors and they were not sending alerts when sitting in water. Turns out the Hub fell off the WiFi (and I had not turned on the alert to let me know Hub was offline). NOTE: DURING ALL OF THIS CONFIGURING AND TESTING, THE HUB, ROUTER, PHONE/APP AND WATER SENSORS WERE ALL WITHIN 2 FEET OF EACH OTHER. Once I reconnected ethernet to Hub, alerts began coming to the app and my email, both which I had selected.- The Hub and Water Leak sensors can be given unique names and assigned to unique room names. I found that renaming the Hub as “Hub #1” was a non-starter. The naming convention would not accept the “#”. This was a trial and error discovery. The naming function also went stupid and would not accept a space at the end of the name I entered accidentally, along with special characters within the name. No error or notice….just would not save the name until I corrected the name to comply with the unknown naming convention. A “Space” within the naming conventions was fine, just not at the end.- All Sensors and Hubs required Firmware update. You have to search for that in the devices’ Detail page. Updates were all completed within about an hour.- I double checked the Water Leak Sensors and subsequent Alert notices. I laid a wet paper towel across each of the three sets of probes (two sets of probes on the bottom, one set of probes on the top), one set at a time. I watched for the Water Leak Sensor red alert light on the Sensor and waited for alert to come to phone. On the four water sensor modules I bought, one set of sensors on the bottom of one Water Leak Sensor did not consistently come on (about 80% of the time no red alert light and no App alert to the phone). I returned that Sensor and YoLink promptly sent a new one which worked properly.- After testing all sets of probes on the Water Leak Sensors initially with a wet paper towel across the pairs of probes, I tested them on the actual surface I will deploy them on. These Sensors are deployed to the attic on the plywood floor. What I found when testing on a piece of plywood was that a steady drip-drip away from the probes eventually ran around the probes and the probes were apparently submerged in a thin layer of water and set off the probe light and alerts. If I just wet the plywood and let it soak in and then put the Sensors on wet plywood with no more dripping, none of the Sensors alerted. Since that’s not the scenario with a leak that would wet the attic plywood I deployed them. But it’s smart to actually test them in exactly the scenario and material you want them to perform…not just with a wet paper towel.- YoLink send me a replacement Hub because the original Hub would not consistently stay on the 2.4 GHz channel even sitting 2 feet from the router. The replacement Hub would not stay on WiFi either. The Hub is now Ethernet connected to a satellite on the WiFi network (using a NetGear Orbi Modem with a master and 2 satellites). I have turned on the alert to tell me when the Hub is offline, which is how I knew it was falling off and getting back on many times over a few hour period when I was connected via 2.4 GHz WiFi channel.- Both email and call to Tech Support (California) were VERY responsive. At some point that frequently stalls in companies and if YoLink doesn’t substantially improve their printed and access to YouTube instructions, their own in-house procedures before shipping, WiFi connection problem, and FAQs, I expect customer satisfaction will fall off.

Sooo easy to setup; Works great; Stellar Customer Support. I do ‘okay’ with today’s tech but I’m not what I’d call tech savvy. This system is so much easier to setup and use than anything else I’ve dealt with lately. Importantly, I have no monthly fees! (I think there may be some upgrades you can opt for but not in my case). The leak sensors give me an instant alarm if I have even the smallest amount of water at any locations in the house/garage where I’ve put a sensor (behind toilet, in under-sink cabinet, beside back of washing machine, etc). On a separate order, we purchased and installed the “YoLink Smart Valve controller 2 with 1″ Brass Motorized Ball Valve” and we linked the valve to the sensors, so with that, it will automatically turn off the water when there is a leak. I can also turn the water off/on from my phone app. I know all this sounds big but it was actually all much easier than it sounds!Even if you don’t get the Hub (which means you won’t use internet/wifi and won’t have the phone app), the LORA technology works so great. LORA Goes much much farther than internet and for us is more reliable than our internet/wifi. So what we did was both. We set this system up to use the internet and therefore use the phone app, AND for the. sensors and valves, we also paired them to each other and have battery back-up for those instances when power is out and/or internet/wifi is down.AND on top of all that, their Customer Support is great. They are real people (not bots), I think in California. They know their products and are very helpful. I’ve dealt with Mesha and Mark, both super helpful, super knowledgeable, Not canned scripted support but actual technical product specialists.

an absolutely fantastic product. This is the 2nd water leak sensor product that I have purchased. The 1st one did not message / email me with info about which sensor was raising an alarm. A fatal flaw IMHO. So I replaced that with a yolink set up and wow am I pleased. The features are everything you could ask for including the ability to add additional people to receive an alarm. As others have stated, the support is sterling. I have 14 sensors set up, toilets, sinks, convectors (we live in a high rise condo, so we have convectors), dishwasher. The only surprise is that you have to purchase an alarm (siren) separately, but that is only because I don’t have Alexa or google speaker products in our home. Again, this is a superb product and a wise purchase, on my part for sure.

Lackluster QA, great value. I bought the kit that came with a hub and four leak detectors. I bought, additionally, the temperature & humidity sensor and two motion detectors.I bought these for a second house that is not always occupied. Setup was incredibly easy – I connected the hub to power and one of the network ports on my router, then immediately setup the wifi in the app and moved it upstairs away from the router. Connectivity over wifi works great. The Android app works well and all the settings are easy to find. One thing worth noting – it does NOT support the 5G wifi band (it warns you of this in the app), so if you have separate SSIDs for 2.4G and 5G make sure you use the 2.4G one.I then connected all my sensors by scanning the QR codes on them with the app. I recommend connecting all your sensors first before creating any “rooms” or automations as you can do it in bulk once you get your sensors scanned in.The only reason I deducted a star was poor QA. The water sensors all operate off two AAA batteries each, and in one of my sensors the batteries were flat dead. I tested them – not low voltage, flat out dead. They are garbage chinesium batteries so while I am not surprised, this should have been caught before the sensor was packaged and sent out. Replacing the batteries was easy enough – four tiny screws were hidden under the feet on the bottom and the device opens in two halves, and you can pop in new batteries once opened. Based on other reviews, these batteries tend to last years so you might not ever need to do this.When I had the unit apart I had the opportunity to take a look at the mechanisms. The main PCB was of high quality, and all the soldered components were stout. There is a very nice gasket/seal that runs around the perimeter of the sensor to keep water out – meaning that even if the sensor were completely submerged I suspect it would not be damaged beyond use once dried out.I have not used any of the automation features, but it looks like they sell an automated water valve you could use to shut off your water if a leak were detected, for example. It also integrates natively into Alexa, Google Assistant, and IFTTT. Again – I did not use any of these features but if you’ve messed with any of those before you know what to expect. If you don’t know what any of that means, don’t worry about it.Overall I am very pleased and I will be purchasing more sensors for this setup. The Android app is easy to use and the added peace of mind is great. I highly recommend the YoLink systems.

These are the best. I bought one set for our second home and they work great for peace of mind. The setup (if you use ethernet) is so easy and quick. I set up all devices in a few minutes. Really plug and play. They are so easy to use and last forever that I bought a second set for our primary home where we had a couple of leaks within a few months cuasing damage.