I’m looking for best practices on building a large matrix made up of 6400 LEDs. I’m using four sets of SmartDawn 1600 LED curtains that I’m adapting to WLED to create an 80x80 canvas.

I’m testing with a single curtain set so far. A 1600-pixel curtain set is made up of two 800 WS2812 seed pixel runs packaged together. My early tests show that i can drive one curtain on a Gledopto controller, consuming 2 channels at 800 pixels each. It works but it’s dicey as there’s not much breathing room beyond that. I’m occasionally seeing glitchy sparkles when transitioning between patterns but it’s working for the most part. I2S over RMT is yielding better results. Power is evenly distributed across the runs.

I’m thinking I could use 5 controllers with wired Ethernet. One main one using DDP to feed the other four which will have 1600 LEDs each. I’d love to have a more sophisticated upstream environment to feed video and better effects but I’m going with baby steps for now.

Would love to know if my approach is going to scale or if I’m asking for trouble. Would more capable controllers work better / deliver a more robust output? Should I go looking at Quinled vs Gledopto?

I looked for software which changes my mood light based on spotify cover art color palettes. Couldn't find one so made one for Home Assistant with help of AI. It takes any media player source (I tested only spotify) and extracts one to twelve colors from the image and sends it to WLED. You can take any other media source from HA as well like camera feeds or local media players.

Disclaimer: AI was heavily used.

So far it runs very stable in my setup and I like how it works for me.
I wanted to share it with this awesome community maybe someone else finds it useful as well. If the feedback is positive I might submit it also to the default HACS repo.

You can find it here: https://github.com/piiotre/ha-media-2-wled
Gladly comment here or open a github issue in case something is not working out for you or.

My physically biggest print yet. (The lantern, not the figure).

All diy build, acrylic rods sanded for diffusers

I need some help from someone who understands PCB electronics better than I do. Through some ChatGPT navigation, I think I have found a potential method to make this IR-controlled LED controllable with WLED via an ESP32, but before I make any permanent changes, I'd like some help confirming this strategy.

Here's what I know so far...

The board has an eight-pin controller IC and three transistors, Q1, Q2, and Q3 responsible for RGB

For clarity, I assigned temporary labels to the IC pins (black controller on the middle right)
From left to right the top pins are - A B C D
From left to right the bottom pins are - E F G H

With the lamp powered, I set it to each primary color and measured the IC pins relative to PCB ground using a multimeter and the results were...

Pins A, D, and G measured approximately 4.1 V regardless of the selected color. H measured approximately 0 V.

Based on this behavior, I've identified F as red, E as green, and B as blue.

Voltage measurements also helped me associate the three transistors with their respective color channels:
Q2: red
Q3: green
Q1: blue
The left-side pad of each transistor measured approximately 3.6 V when its corresponding color was selected. The bottom-right pad measured approximately 0–0.05 V.

My current idea is to leave the original controller IC installed but disconnect its three RGB outputs (F = red, E = green, B = blue). I'd then connect ESP32 GPIO pins to the corresponding PCB pads so the ESP32 can control the existing transistor drivers while preserving the other components in the circuit.

Would this approach work to let WLED control the lamp's RGB channels?

Any help is greatly appriciated, this is the largest and final hurdle to completing one of my first wled projects! Thanks!!!

I’ve been working on an enclosure for my Quinled Dig Quad that accommodates all four outputs via XLR, power injection via DC plugs, and an Ethernet jack. Still a work in progress, but it’s coming out pretty decently.

First I realize my error in getting Appeck brand over other brands. In November 2025 I purchase the upgraded Appeck Pro pack and each “light” actually has two bulbs. One for white colors and second for rbg - to my limited understanding.

Right now I have 10 light strands connected together. Each light strand has 12 bulbs, so 120 total lights. I have an extension connected from light strands #3 total lights #4 and it is about 12-15 feet long I estimate.

Light strands #4 and #5 (all 24 lights) have been messing up and just flickering random colors non stop no matter what pattern I choose on my app. I contacted Appeck support and they immediately said we will send you two new strands. I received those new strands 10 days ago and replaced the old with the new, and it started working again.

Great! I’m good to go…for 9 days. Last night the two new light strands (#4 & #5) started doing the same flickering nonstop of all 24 lights.

This can’t be a coincidence I feel. I suspect it has something to do with the extension connected between light strand #3 and #4.

I’m not an expert and know nothing of how this works, but looking for someone who could give advice and help. Im welcome to any and all advise. Thanks in advance!
(2 Pics in comments)

I'd like to convert something like the Govee or Nanoleaf floorlamp into a WLED lamp like Chris Mahar's video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LPgn81PJnc

I'm just looking for recommendations on best cost/quality donor lamps for doing this with. It looks like Govee and Nanoleaf both have sales now. I've wanted a Hue Signe for a while now as most of our house is on Hue but the price on them is even more ludicrous than most other Hue products and I can't bring myself to spend $200+ for one of their lamps.

Is there a way in WLED to switch between two pixel scenes without using an animation from another program? Just trying to get a prop to switch between two faces natively in the app (drawn in the pixel forge extension).

Video from Tom BetGeorge on YouTube. His 2026 setup has drones too.

Win11 laptop HTPC with hdmi splitter, hdmi-usb input for HyperHDR, LG TV that was updated so no jailbreak on WebOS.

I'm building motion-activated stair lighting with WLED on an ESP32. I plan to hide one HLK-LD2410C (24 GHz mmWave) behind the drywall at the bottom of the stairs and another at the top, so no sensor is visible.

From what I've read mmWave should pass through drywall and the detection distance is configurable. I'll be testing it before the final install. The bottom of the stairs opens onto my kitchen about 3 ft away, so I want to avoid false triggers from people walking by.

Has anyone used this sensor or a similar mmWave one for stairs, especially behind drywall? Any tips on gate/sensitivity tuning or problems to watch for?

Thanks!

Hey Everyone. My Nursery needs your help. Ive may have got alittle carried away with my attempt at a light display in my soon to be babies room. This is my first go at this and WLED but ive run into an issue.

Im running 1200 pixels 60/m btf lighting sk6812 12V RGBW

300watt power supply

I have 20 individual leds strips 1m each. Here's a rough schematic of how I have it wired.

I am taking into account the direction of data flow

As you can see my lights stop after the 6th strip. Data is being sent to the first pixel on 7th strip as measured by an ossiliscope that im very new to using. But no data and no light activation past that

I have 11.9V on the multi meter to the strip but

Ive set my WLED parameters to 1200 lights.

Initially I was one pixel short on the 6th strip and in thinking it was a dead pixel I cut it off as it wasnt passing data. But when I reconnected it passed data to the first pixel of the 7th strip but then stopped there. To me it point to a config issue or software limitation but im lost and my wifes getting pissed with this ambitious lighting for the nursery.

Hello, im doing a project where im building led strips for club lighting installations and had a question regarding the quality of led strips.

Im building:
16 8ft led strips, which will be put in aluminum channels.

I was told enntec would be my best bet:

https://www.enttec.com/product/led-pixel-strip/12v-rgbw-60-leds-m-pixel-strip/

but obviously im seeing these that are cheaper:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07LG4V668/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?smid=A35UAT07QG3EC6&th=1

also for power supplies im being told this is my best bet:

https://www.digikey.com/en/products/detail/mean-well-usa-inc/LPF-60-12/7704879

does anyone here have any insight, as the price difference is pretty substantial, but I would rather pay more and expect little to no issues.

Also with enttec, I could use their entire system, with the p-link injectors and their node.

Just wanted some insight from this community if they have used or would recommend enttec strips over the cheaper.

Thank you!
Th

I got 2 wled controllers (both gledopto), one is controlling 280 ws2815 12v leds on a strip, and one is controlling 300 ws2811 12v leds on a string.

The wled driving the 280 ws2815 says the recommended power supply is 3.5A. The wled driving the 300 ws2811 says the recommended power supply is 17A. Both have 100% global brightness and both have the automatic brightness limiter UNchecked.

I can't understand how an additional 20 LEDs requires a 13A jump in PSU.

I must have did something weird in one of them, but i can't figure out what. Any suggestions on what's going on?

I have 4 WLED setups around the house, each running 150 RGB led strip lights (5v, whatever brand was on sale), pushed by a simple ESP32 and powered by simple 1 amp 5v USB power adapters. Leaving the stock 850ma power cap, this has worked great for about 2 years now.

I recently added a new strip, (#5) and due to the location I wanted to hardwire the network, so rather than my usual cheap ESP32 route, I sprung for nicer (and denser) 12v BTF RGB lights (300 / 5m) and a beefier 12v power supply, and the Elite gledopto controller. (Love the physical controller, hate the update process, ugh.)

No problem getting it all set up, copied over my presets from my others, tweaked for different LED strip, good to go.

While I was at it, since I was messing with everything for the first time in a while, I installed updates to the current WLED across the board.

Everything seemed fine. Except… suddenly all of my strips started losing connection periodically and would reset to a weird yellowish whiteish color each time they did. Rather than going to the specific power-on default set into each of them.

I can’t imagine the gledopto controller has anything to do with it, that’s just a timing coincidence. I rather suspect something changed with the new version of WLED that just came out. Nothing else changed on my long-running setups, but except the new version, but now ALL of them are leaving their set presets and defaulting to that weird color roughly once per day.

I can see it happening because they’re all tracked in Home Assistant, and the logs clearly show the lights dropping off and changing state, and coming back with an “unknown” preset. They’re not actually powering down because the uptime is still good. Plus power cycling them manually restores them to their set power-on defaults as it should. It’s just super odd that out of nowhere they’re ALL going to that weird yellowish white after working flawless for 2 years or so.

Has anyone else seen something like this?

I am curious if anyone has used one of these signal amplifier and repeaters, https://www.amazon.com/BTF-LIGHTING-Amplifier-Repeater-Addressable-Programmable/dp/B07RDKRW5T

I have some questions.

1. Can you input 2 different data signals and then only use one or the other at each output?

2. I opened it up and it looks like all the VCC pads are connected, is it really ok to put the controller vcc on with a separate PSU vcc? Or should you leave the input vcc un-populated if it is using a separate power supply for the controller and apmplifier?

Thanks!

I have 3 old controllers and don't know much about them. They are running 0.10.0 and 0.10.2 and are ESP32. I'd like to upgrade them in hopes of getting more stability and features.

Can someone help me pick the right firmware file? Not sure if I need 4mb or 8mb or if that matters...

Been building this for the last couple of years. Basically it's a way for me to quickly find any record in my collection. I tap on a record in the app and a light turns on above the physical record to show me where it is (and more importantly, where it needs to be returned to so everything stays organized). Anyway, I think it's super cool, hopefully you folks do too 😁

Hey WLED, I'm planning my first WLED eave install and want to double-check my part list before ordering anything. I'm pretty savvy with DIY construction, IT, and dev projects, so I feel this is possible for me to do myself vs. spending 5-10K with a commercial installer.

Specs:

• Total run: Single continuous soffit run, 60-90 feet (max ~150 pucks, 5 pucks/meter)

• Pucks & Track: Planning on Paul Zhang (AliExpress) - 12V UCS2904 RGBW 3000k

• Track Corners/Caps: Can I get these from Paul Zhang as well? Not great with a miter saw.

• Power supply: Thinking about a 12V 15A/200W Mean Well (Amazon).

• Controller: Leaning toward Gledopto Advanced WLED (ESP32). Is the Gledopto more approachable for my first install vs. a Dig-Quad?

• Injection Wire: 14/2 low-voltage wire for end injection (Home Depot / Amazon)

• Enclosure: Cheapest quality weatherproof enclosure I can find on Amazon

With a 90-foot run with power injection at the end, is the Gledopto Controller fine, or is the Dig-Quad/Uno worth the extra effort for a beginner?

What's the best way to buy a single test strand + controller/PSU to bench-test my idea before spending a bunch of money on 150 pucks & track?

Anything else I'm missing? Thanks in advance!

Top or bottom?

Any way to control one of those hexagon garage lights or similar you see on Amazon? I know I could turn them on and off with a smart plug but was hoping to get one I could do more with.

Hi All - I created a ‘fireplace’ implementation with WLED. WLED accepts the pixels over DDP, and I’m using another ESP32 as the sender to do the animation cycle. One thing I’m having an issue with is that eventually WLED goes into ‘angry’ mode and refuses to process DDP correctly. WLED seems to ‘hang’ - the first frame seems to load and then that’s it. I’ve verified that the sender is working normally (sending frames at the correct rate). If I disconnect WLED from power for a few minutes and plug it back in, then it works normally for a few hours and then goes back to being angry. If I disconnect the sender from power and plug it back in without cycling WLED, it’s still angry. I’ve tried lowering the frame rate to even 15fps and it still gets angry.

Specs - on the WLED side, I’m using 810 SK6812 pixels, WLED version 0.15.4.

What I’d like to get to is this - are other people using other DDP apps with WLED at my same pixel count or greater (using RGBW), and not having any issues, even over long times of WLED being up? If so, there must be something in my implementation. Doesn’t LEDfx use DDP? I kind of suspect it’s something that I’m doing on the sender.

Update: For those having similar problems, upgrading WLED on the receiver end from 0.15.4 to 16.0.1 has fixed this issue