I’ve had a fitbit wifi bathroom scale for a while. Getting the data out got suddenly more difficult when Google bought them, and I didn’t love giving that data to google. It’s finally died, and I’m looking at replacement options.
In a perfect world, I could just go to a store and buy a “HomeAssistant Ready” scale. If I can’t have that, I’d like a scale that is on my local network and exposes the last x weigh-ins as an API on the device, then I could write something to poll it.
I haven’t seen anything like those, but have turned up:
- a project to decode the bluetooth transmissions of a number of scales (after you build an ESP32 device for it)
- the Withings cloud based scale, but with a well documented API
Any other good options?
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I think looking at openscale would be worthwhile:
https://github.com/oliexdev/openScale/wiki
Looks like it can push to mqtt? Huh, that’s new to me.
Also, if you want HA, there’s this:
https://github.com/lolouk44/hassio-addons/blob/master/mi-scale/DOCS.md
Good luck!
I use openscale and a Beuer BF700 (I think that’s the model #, it’s a model listed in the github wiki) and it works great, although I had to do the initial setup on their proprietary app to get the profiles to work right, and the scale had to be imported/was a bit hard to find. The wiki includes instructions for modifying a scale to add an arduino and the necessary bits to DIY one if you’re at all technically inclined.
I recommend it, but YMMV if you try to use a newer scale. If I ever have more time I would like to try to extend the drivers to support more scales, because openscale is very good software.
Wait what I thought this was satire at first
you can’t even poke fun at selfhosted people anymore because someone WILL 100% spend 48 hours straight 3d printing and programming a toothbrush
edit: you have to be kidding me https://kuenzi.dev/toothbrush/That would be a fun thread. What’s the most unnecessary self hosted thing you’ve seen someone host or host
I thought this one was dumb too https://lemm.ee/post/49060797
Lmao
Can you just get a normal scale? I just have a mechanical one from the last century
I mean, yes, I could. But I’m committed to the #selfhosted life where I spend hours building unnecessarily complicated systems to make my life easier in small ways.
It just feels like a very dark reality
OpenScale works great and kind of does what you want. If you have an old Android phone laying around you can have it persistently connected to a cheap Bluetooth scale. Functional, but at a much have higher power cost than an ESP32 solution. Automated database exports to a local file (on the android device) and Syncthing can move your data around for analysis.
The good folks over at Gadgetbridge might have a solution too, although their list of supported scales looks pretty short.
You might also look into making a project like rmfakecloud to trick your Fitbit device into pushing data to a local server.
Not sure about home assistant though, I’ve never used it.
I don’t have any options for you but make sure you get one that doesn’t use battery when not in use. It’s really annoying replacing those little coin batteries all the time even though you only use it like .001% of the time
I’ve had a withings scale for like 5 or 6 years, use trendweight.com for a graph, I haven’t had any problems with it besides replacing the batteries every year or so
I’m starting to think my commitment to the Apple ecosystem and my desire for self-hosting are at odds.
Where’s that meme about tech enthusiasts and tech employees with a printer gun, where does this guy fall
Not local, but I’ve been using my withings scale for at least 5 years, and I sync the weights with its home assistant automation from the withings api, then plot the data on a custom health dashboard I made.
I’d love a local alternative, but regardless I haven’t had any problems with my setup.
If you can find an old working Wii Fit Balance Board you can use it as a very accurate Bluetooth scale.
Did you do that?
If yes, could you share some info about it?I did not. Foolishly I got rid of my balance board after some years of no use.
It’s interesting how old console tech comes back around to be useful for other stuff. I’ve used a couple Xbox Kinects to do 3D scanning and with an augmented reality sand box.
Really? That’s a good idea.
I use Tasker to log my weight to a Google Sheets spreadsheet, and just use a dumb scale.
The only piece of technology in my house is a toaster from 1982, and I keep a loaded shotgun next to it just in case it makes a noise I don’t recognize.
What if the shotgun makes a noise you don’t recognize? Hit it with the toaster?
If my shotgun starts making strange noises, I check the brownies.
I am SCP-426, your toaster.
The only technology in my house is me, and I keep a loaded shotgun next to me in case I make a noise I don’t recognize.
(Am I doing this right?)
I do similar with a shortcut on my phone to a [NocoDB Form].
Same here but with Apple Health. You can even build some Shortcut to log the weight via Siri if you like to.
I zoomed in on the screen because I just assumed this was a meme.
… male feet. That’s what I’m going with.
It doesn’t sync to homeassistant, but I use a Xiaomi scale with openScale off of F-Droid. There’s a few different scales supported: https://github.com/oliexdev/openScale/wiki/Supported-scales-in-openScale
I use miscale 1 with gadgetbridge. Homeassistant has also autodiscivered it, but I’m hessitant to pair it with 2 different devices so no idea if it actually works.
This is what I use. Replaced my old Fitbit Aria 2. I weighed in on both scales for about a month, and it was consistently 0.15 kg below, which is good. The body fat measurement was a bit more off, and it varies almost nothing over long periods of time, but I don’t really trust those measurements anyway.
I believe you can set up the scale in GadgetBridge as well, but I have not tried to do that.
I have a withings and I really like it. Their privacy policy made me feel better about allowing my info on the cloud. You can run it offline (it sends weight via Bluetooth to the app but won’t show 7-day trend an scale screen without wifi). I don’t mind that, so I leave it disconnected. I don’t use a home assistant though so I can’t speak to that part.
I have the withings watch also, so I use the app as my catch all health tracker which works well. it’s nice to have everything together. Can’t speak to any others but I’d recommend withings.
I went from Fitbit to Withings, that Fitbit scale was nothing but pain. Every time my battery started getting low it would disconnect from Wi-Fi and I have to re pair it. It was inconsistent, If you pick it up and move it a foot to the left you get a completely different reading than if you just leave it where it sits. Because of the messed up fluctuations, It constantly identified the wrong person in the house.
Had the Withings scale for 4 years now and it’s just been fine.
