ESP32 Bluetooth Low Energy Tracker Hub

The esp32_ble_tracker component creates a global hub so that you can track bluetooth low energy devices using your ESP32 node.

See Setting up devices for information on how you can determine the MAC address of a device and track it using ESPHome.

Warning

The BLE software stack on the ESP32 consumes a significant amount of RAM on the device.

Crashes are likely to occur if you include too many additional components in your device’s configuration. Memory-intensive components such as Voice Assistant and other audio components are most likely to cause issues.

# Example configuration entry
esp32_ble_tracker:

binary_sensor:
  - platform: ble_presence
    mac_address: XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
    name: "ESP32 BLE Presence Google Home Mini"

sensor:
  - platform: ble_rssi
    mac_address: XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
    name: "BLE Google Home Mini RSSI value"
  - platform: xiaomi_hhccjcy01
    mac_address: XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
    temperature:
      name: "Xiaomi MiFlora Temperature"
    moisture:
      name: "Xiaomi MiFlora Moisture"
    illuminance:
      name: "Xiaomi MiFlora Illuminance"
    conductivity:
      name: "Xiaomi MiFlora Soil Conductivity"
    battery_level:
      name: "Xiaomi MiFlora Battery Level"
  - platform: xiaomi_lywsdcgq
    mac_address: XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
    temperature:
      name: "Xiaomi MiJia Temperature"
    humidity:
      name: "Xiaomi MiJia Humidity"
    battery_level:
      name: "Xiaomi MiJia Battery Level"

Note

The first time this component is enabled for an ESP32, the code partition needs to be resized. Please flash the ESP32 via USB when adding this to your configuration. After that, you can use OTA updates again.

Configuration variables:

  • scan_parameters (Optional): Advanced parameters for configuring the scan behavior of the ESP32. See also this guide by Texas Instruments for reference.

    • interval (Optional, Time): The interval between each consecutive scan window. This is the time the ESP spends on each of the 3 BLE advertising channels. Defaults to 320ms.

    • window (Optional, Time): The time the ESP is actively listening for packets on a channel during each scan interval. If this is close to the interval value, the ESP will spend more time listening to packets (but also consume more power). Defaults to 30ms

    • duration (Optional, Time): The duration of each complete scan. This has no real impact on the device but can be used to debug the BLE stack. Defaults to 5min.

    • active (Optional, boolean): Whether to actively send scan requests to request more data after having received an advertising packet. With some devices this is necessary to receive all data, but also drains those devices’ power a bit more. Some devices don’t need this, in that case you can save power and RF pollution by setting it to false. Defaults to true.

    • continuous (Optional, boolean): Whether to scan continuously (forever) or to only scan when asked to start a scan (with start_scan action). Defaults to true.

  • id (Optional, ID): Manually specify the ID for this ESP32 BLE Hub.

Automations:

ESP32 Bluetooth Low Energy Tracker Automation

on_ble_advertise Trigger

This automation will be triggered when a Bluetooth advertising is received. A variable x of type esp32_ble_tracker::ESPBTDevice is passed to the automation for use in lambdas.

esp32_ble_tracker:
  on_ble_advertise:
    - mac_address:
        - XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
        - XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
      then:
        - lambda: |-
            ESP_LOGD("ble_adv", "New BLE device");
            ESP_LOGD("ble_adv", "  address: %s", x.address_str().c_str());
            ESP_LOGD("ble_adv", "  name: %s", x.get_name().c_str());
            ESP_LOGD("ble_adv", "  Advertised service UUIDs:");
            for (auto uuid : x.get_service_uuids()) {
                ESP_LOGD("ble_adv", "    - %s", uuid.to_string().c_str());
            }
            ESP_LOGD("ble_adv", "  Advertised service data:");
            for (auto data : x.get_service_datas()) {
                ESP_LOGD("ble_adv", "    - %s: (length %i)", data.uuid.to_string().c_str(), data.data.size());
            }
            ESP_LOGD("ble_adv", "  Advertised manufacturer data:");
            for (auto data : x.get_manufacturer_datas()) {
                ESP_LOGD("ble_adv", "    - %s: (length %i)", data.uuid.to_string().c_str(), data.data.size());
            }

Configuration variables:

  • mac_address (Optional, list of MAC Address): The MAC address to filter for this automation.

  • See Automation.

on_ble_manufacturer_data_advertise Trigger

This automation will be triggered when a Bluetooth advertising with manufacturer data is received. A variable x of type std::vector<uint8_t> is passed to the automation for use in lambdas.

sensor:
  - platform: template
    name: "BLE Sensor"
    id: ble_sensor

esp32_ble_tracker:
  on_ble_manufacturer_data_advertise:
    - mac_address: XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
      manufacturer_id: 0590
      then:
        - lambda: |-
            if (x[0] != 0x7b || x[1] != 0x61) return;
            int value = x[2] + (x[3] << 8);
            id(ble_sensor).publish_state(value);

Configuration variables:

  • mac_address (Optional, MAC Address): The MAC address to filter for this automation.

  • manufacturer_id (Required, string): 16 bit, 32 bit, or 128 bit BLE Manufacturer ID.

  • See Automation.

on_ble_service_data_advertise Trigger

This automation will be triggered when a Bluetooth advertising with service data is received. A variable x of type std::vector<uint8_t> is passed to the automation for use in lambdas.

sensor:
  - platform: template
    name: "BLE Sensor"
    id: ble_sensor

esp32_ble_tracker:
  on_ble_service_data_advertise:
    - mac_address: XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
      service_uuid: 181A
      then:
        - lambda: 'id(ble_sensor).publish_state(x[0]);'

Configuration variables:

  • mac_address (Optional, MAC Address): The MAC address to filter for this automation.

  • service_uuid (Required, string): 16 bit, 32 bit, or 128 bit BLE Service UUID.

  • See Automation.

on_scan_end Trigger

This automation will be triggered when a Bluetooth scanning sequence has completed. If running with continuous set to true, this will trigger every time the scan completes (the duration of a scan).

esp32_ble_tracker:
  on_scan_end:
    - then:
        - lambda: |-
             ESP_LOGD("ble_auto", "The scan has ended!");

Configuration variables:

esp32_ble_tracker.start_scan Action

Start a Bluetooth scan. If there is a scan already in progress, then the action is ignored.

esp32_ble_tracker:
  scan_parameters:
    continuous: false

on_...:
  - esp32_ble_tracker.start_scan:

Configuration variables:

  • continuous (Optional, boolean): Whether to start the scan in continuous mode. Defaults to false

Note

This action can also be written in lambdas:

esp32_ble_tracker:
  id: ble_tracker_id

id(ble_tracker_id).start_scan()

esp32_ble_tracker.stop_scan Action

Stops the bluetooth scanning. It can be started again with the above start scan action.

esp32_ble_tracker:

on_...:
  - esp32_ble_tracker.stop_scan:

Use on single-core chips

On dual-core devices the WiFi component runs on core 1, while this component runs on core 0. When using this component on single core chips such as the ESP32-C3 both WiFi and ble_tracker must run on the same core, and this has been known to cause issues when connecting to WiFi. A work-around for this is to enable the tracker only while the native API is connected. The following config will achieve this:

esp32_ble_tracker:
  scan_parameters:
    continuous: false

api:
  encryption:
    key: !secret encryption_key
  on_client_connected:
    - esp32_ble_tracker.start_scan:
       continuous: true
  on_client_disconnected:
    - esp32_ble_tracker.stop_scan:

See Also