Fitting one Shelly is quick. Fitting fourteen in the same home, each on the right network, with the right IP and current firmware, is where the morning goes. This guide is about the second case: configuring several devices in a row with the SIT-IoT app, and then keeping an eye on them from the console.
Before you start: the network decides
The mistake that costs the most time is not a configuration mistake, it is coverage. A Shelly tucked into a back box behind a metal frame can have enough signal to provision and not enough to work. The app marks weak networks in red: if you see that red, fix the coverage before going on, because that device will be back to bother you in a month.
Have the SSID and password of the final network to hand, not the one on the phone in your pocket. Changing the network later means repeating the process on every device.
1. Provision in batches
With your phone on the network the devices will live on, open Add new device and check that the app is showing that network and not another one. It is the step people skip, and the reason half an installation ends up on the wrong Wi-Fi.
Enter the SSID and password once and start the automatic configuration: the app finds the Shelly devices in range and configures them one after another. That is the real difference from doing it device by device through each one’s own access point.
Static IP, now rather than later
The options in that same step let you assign a static IP. Do it now. A Shelly on DHCP works until the router restarts and hands the addresses out differently; then the automations pointing at a fixed address stop responding, and you hear about it from the client. Assigning it while provisioning costs nothing and prevents that call.
If the installation is going to speak MQTT, the broker is configured in this step too. Leaving it for later means touching every device again.
2. Firmware, before you close anything up
With the devices on the network, Device status tells you which ones have an update waiting. Update before you close back boxes and ceilings: a device you can reach updates in a minute, and one walled in with troublesome firmware is a return visit.
Each device restarts by itself when it finishes. Let them all finish before you call the installation done.
3. What happens afterwards: the console
This is where this guide parts company with an ordinary tutorial. Provisioning is the beginning; the installer’s real problem arrives three months later, when somebody rings to say “a light isn’t working” and you have no idea which of the fourteen it is.
Devices you provision are bound to a project — usually that home or that client — and they appear in console.sit-iot.com. From a browser, without driving anywhere:
- Last seen for each device. It is the first thing to check: it separates a failed device from one that simply lost the Wi-Fi.
- Firmware version on each one, which is how you spot the one that got left behind in the update.
- Status and telemetry refreshing on screen, so you can see the effect of a change without reloading.
And when the installation is handed over, a device can have an assigned user: the client sees theirs and nothing else. If it later changes hands, the device is transferred to another project without being provisioned again.
When something goes wrong
- A device does not show up in the automatic search: restart it and try again. If it still does not appear, factory reset it from the advanced settings and start that one over.
- It provisions and then disappears: almost always coverage. Check the signal strength from the advanced settings, in the device’s final position and with the box closed.
- You changed the router and they all stopped answering: nothing is broken. The devices are still looking for the old network and need provisioning again — which, in a batch, is once more a matter of minutes.
The app is on Google Play: SIT-IoT Smart Installer Tool.