SONOFF Hydro DUO is a dual-channel Zigbee 3.0 and Bluetooth 5 LE smart water valve with up to 12 customized watering schedules, a flow meter, and alerts for frost risk, leakage, low battery, and water shortages.
Paisit previously reviewed the SONOFF SWV smart water valve, but the company has now launched the Hydro series with various improvements, including a brass inlet instead of a plastic one, weather-based skipping, real-time alerts, flow metering, and dual Zigbee + BLE so it can work even without a Zigbee gateway. The single-channel Hydro models were introduced earlier this year, and now the Hydro DUO offers a variant with two outlets to manage two watering zones.
SONOFF Hydro DUO (SWV-ZF2U/SWV-ZF2E) specifications:
- MCU – Telink TLSR8258 (TLSR8258F1KAT32) multiprotocol microcontroller @ 48 MHz with BLE 5 and Zigbee 3.0, RF4CE, Thread, 6LoWPAN, HomeKit, ANT, and 2.4GHz proprietary connectivity
- Inlets
- SWV-ZF2U model – NH (National Hose) pipe thread for North America
- SWV-ZF2E model – BSP (British Standard Pipe) pipe thread for the UK, Europe, and most other countries and regions
- Working water pressure – 0.06~0.8 MPa
- Misc
- Built-in flow meter
- A/B buttons for manual control
- Power Supply
- 3V via 4x 1.5V AA batteries (2x serial, 2x parallel) typically good for one year
- 5V/1A via USB Type-C 5V 1A
- Dimensions – 132 x 121 x 67 mm (ABS enclosure, brass inlets)
- IP Rating – IP65
- Temperature Range
- Air – 0~50°C
- Water – 5~40°C
- Humidity – 5%~95% RH,non-condensing
- Altitude – Below 2,000 meters
The Hydro DUO is primarily designed to work with the eWelink app, but it’s also compatible with MQTT-compatible frameworks such as Home Assistant, and Smart Home solutions such as Google Home, Amazon Alexa, Samsung SmartThings, and Apple Home. Note that users may need a Matter Bridge such as ZBBridge-U, iHost, Cube OS with SONOFF Zigbee dongle, or a dedicated gateway for the four commercial solutions.
Features include Smart Schedule with duration or capacity, watering history (duration, volume), alarms for low battery, water shortage, leakage, or freezing, as well as manual irrigation, rain delay (no need to water if it rains), seasonal adjustments, and child lock. Check out the documentation for details. One important detail is that not all features are available in “Proximity mode” (BLE): weather-based adjustment and scene linkage only work over Zigbee.
The table below compares the Hydro DUO to the earlier Hydrone ONE (one zone) and Hydrio ONE Lite (one zone, no flow meter). All basically share the same features, but for some reason, SONOFF decided to change the way the four batteries deliver power by using a 2s2P 3V configuration in the DUO, against a 4S 6V configuration in the ONE models.
The SONOFF Hydro DUO dual-channel Zigbee/BLE smart water valve can be pre-ordered for $42.21 on the SONOFF store. Just make sure you select the right model (EU or US) for your region. The coupon code CNXSOFT adds a 10% discount to the price, bringing it down to $37.99 (the coupon doesn’t work on pre-orders). Shipping is scheduled to start by the end of June.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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