Control your Christmas lights with a $5 Raspberry Pi Zero and Plugable Bluetooth switches

Last Update: December 23rd, 2020
Article ID: 777606



The Holidays are upon us, and with it come the sights and sounds of the special season—sleigh bells, Santa Claus, chestnuts roasting by the fire, and colorful displays of Christmas lights! Here at Plugable we can’t do much about the bells and the chestnuts, but we definitely have some ideas about the lights.


We’ve put together a fun Python project that will allow you to go wild with multiple strings of Christmas lights and other decorations, using just a five dollar Raspberry Pi Zero, a Plugable USB-BT4LE Bluetooth adapter and one Plugable Bluetooth Home Automation Switch for each decoration you want to control. It also works with a Raspberry Pi B+ or Pi 2.


The concept is simple: Plugable Bluetooth home automation switches allow you to freely switch on and off any house-current-powered device within Bluetooth range. The Raspberry Pi is a cheap, simple little computer that can talk to the switches. Put them together, and you have a setup that gives you Ultimate Power over your display.