Shelly vs Sonoff: which smart switch should you buy?
If you're adding smart control to an existing home, two names come up again and again: Shelly and Sonoff. Both are affordable, both are popular, and both can turn ordinary lights, fans and appliances into something you control from your phone or by voice. But they suit different homes. Here's how we choose between them when we install for clients.
The short answer
If you care most about local control and privacy, Shelly is usually the better pick. If you want the lowest price and a big range of ready-made devices, Sonoff is hard to beat. In many homes we use both — the right device for each spot.
Control: local vs cloud
Shelly devices are built around local control. They expose a local API and work fully over your own Wi-Fi, with no dependence on a manufacturer's cloud. Pair that with Home Assistant and your switches keep working even when the internet is down.
Sonoff, by default, leans on the eWeLink cloud. That's simple to set up, but it means an outage or a company decision can affect your home. The good news: most Sonoff devices can be flashed with Tasmota or ESPHome to become fully local — something we do routinely.
See it in action
Here's a quick look at both wired into a real Home Assistant dashboard.
Privacy
Because Shelly runs locally, your on/off events and sensor data can stay entirely inside your home. That matters more than people expect — a light switch that phones home is still a light switch reporting when you're in. Sonoff can match this once it's local, but out of the box it's more cloud-connected.
Integration
- Home Assistant: both integrate well; Shelly is near plug-and-play, Sonoff is best after flashing.
- Matter and Zigbee: both brands now offer models on these standards, which future-proofs your setup.
- Voice: both work with Google Assistant and Alexa.
So, which one?
Pick Shelly for a private, local-first home you rarely have to think about. Pick Sonoff to cover a lot of devices on a budget, especially if you're happy to flash them. And if that sounds like more than you want to deal with — that's exactly what we do.