Best mmWave Human Presence Sensor
smarthomescene.com
In this article, we are testing 3 mmWave Human Presence Sensors and comparing their performance. The Aqara FP1, and two Tuya Sensors: ZY-M100 and PS-HPS.

I was thinking about getting a presence sensor for the living room (so I don’t wake up in the dark because I fell asleep in there) and I stumbled across Smart Home Scenes articles covering a few of them, so I thought I might as well bundle them together.

In November last year, they did a comparison of three, then current, examples - Aqara’s FP1 and Tuya’s ZY-M100 and PS-HPS. It’s a lengthy breakdown but they conclude:

As far as pricing goes, nothing can beat the ZY-M100 and the features it offers for half the price of the Aqara FP1. Considering the PS-HPS is around the same price, I would not regard it as a viable alternative as it falls short in so many categories.

Since then, Aqara have released the FP2 which they reviewed in April this year:

When it comes to price, naturally the Aqara FP1 is cheaper than it’s successor. The real question is, is the FP2 worth it’s price tag of $82.99? Obviously, that’s up to you to decide.

  • Is multi-person detection something you need or want?
  • Is native HomeKit and Matter support important for your setup?
  • Is cloud dependency okay with you, perhaps until the FP2 is completely jailbroken?

I feel like the Aqara FP1 is still a capable mmWave presence sensor, if implemented correctly. Better yet, the Tuya ZY-M100 is an incredible alternative at a really low price. I may be biased, because I love local communication (Zigbee) and don’t really like to depend on Wi-Fi for these types of devices. The choice is yours.

They also compared the Everything Presence One to the FP2:

In comparing the EP1 to Aqara’s FP2, I could not decide for certain which one is the more capable static human presence sensor. In each test, they clocked in at the same second, making them almost identical as far as presence detection speed goes. The FP2 was faster by around 30 seconds in clearing presence though, so it might be able to save you a few bucks by turning the lights off earlier.

Regarding static human presence in a room, they both performed similarly with no clear winner. I suffered false positive triggers on both devices from my curtains, until I turned them to face the other direction. This is something that you will need to optimize yourself, as it’s largely dependent on your installation area/room.