Troubleshooting: I cannot pair an eWeLink device to the Wi-Fi network

First please check, if

RF433-only devices (such as an RF wireless switch or an RF remote controller) need to be paired with an RF Bridge or directly with an eWeLink smart device with an RF receiver, not a Wi-Fi router.

Similarly, Zigbee devices need to be paired with a Zigbee bridge, not with the Wi-Fi router with the app.

Wireless devices without Wi-Fi and Zigbee, supporting only eWeLink-Remote (Blutooth) protocol need to be paired not with the Wi-Fi, but with a compatible smart device with eWeLink-Remote receiver or hub. Read more about this in the manual of the device.

If it is indeed an eWeLink compatible Wi-Fi device, read on about reasons why you may fail to pair your device with eWeLink app:

The latest eWeLink apps run an automatic scan to find eWeLink devices in pairing mode. However, some older generation of eWeLink devices may not be compatible with this, and only support special pairing methods. First, we advise that you check in the product manual what is the proper pairing method for your device.

For example, some devices (like older camera models) may only use Voice pairing. In such cases the standard automatic pairing method may not work. Tap "More options" link in the eWeLink app to discover more pairing methods.

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Unless your manual says otherwise, you should use Automatic Pairing in the eWeLink app to connect your smart device to the Wi-Fi network. Check the below short guide to make sure you made it right.

In order to pair eWeLink-compatible Sonoff / SmartWise / other eWeLink devices, you need to put the device into “QUICK PAIRING” mode first, before you start the pairing process in the eWeLink app.

On most devices you need to keep pusing the Wi-Fi pairing button for approx. 7-8 seconds, and then see the Wi-Fi status LED flashing quickly 3 times, then pause, the 3 flash again… this is when they are in pairing mode.

(Devices without Wi-Fi status LED (such as LED strips or bulbs) flash their lights instead, when they are in pairing mode.)

Note: some devices (such as SmartWise garage door controller or some Zigbee or RF gateways) do not have a visible pairing button, but a hole / a hidden button under the cover. Try to push it with a paper clip, thumbtack, or a push pin. Once you see the 3-times Wi-Fi LED flashing, you may start pairing process in the app.

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– Oh no! Really? – you may say now. – Yes, it may happen to everyone. Mobile screens are very small and it is very easy to mistype a password on a mobile phone touch screen. Also, we have so many passwords, some of us even have multiple home or office Wi-Fi networks, so please double-check if you really used the right password.

The typical symptom of having a mistyped password is that the pairing process steps are successfully passed, the new device appears in the app, but it stays OFFLINE.

Just repeat the pairing and make sure the password is correct. You can also display the typed password in the app.

Note: some routers have strict limitations for the guest networks, so you may want to test with the real home network too, if guest network pairing does not work.

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In most cases Automatic Pairing finds and connects to the eWeLink devices within 60 seconds.

If not, you may try an alternative pairing method, which should work fine in most other cases. This is called “Compatible pairing”, and it is basically a less automated way of pairing.

What happens in “Compatible pairing” is that you manually look for the eWeLink device’s Wi-Fi AP name, connect to it with your phone, then let the phone do the configuration of the device to the Wi-Fi and connection to the cloud. So you basically skip the automatic discovery but you manually connect your phone to the smart device.

1. On the smart device,

2. Now in the app:

open the pairing screen and scroll down to the bottom (may be outside of the default visible screen) and tap the “Compatible mode” button on the screen where you entered your Wi-Fi credentials.

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We have seen cases when pairing failed using a certain phone and was successful with another. Why? There can be several reasons. One reason can be that an older phone has an outdated operating system, and newest eWeLink apps are not available for that older OS version. And a very old eWeLink app may not be fully compatible with all newer smart devices.

It may also happen, that there is some security software or firewall installed on a phone, which prevents the connection.

Also, it is a known issue that some Apple phones running old iOS v13 version may experience pairing problems (all other feature working well) with most eWeLink devices.

Anyway, if you experience pairing problems, it is generally a good idea to use another phone or table for the pairing. (And then, of course, you may use your own phone later to manage your smart home devices with the same login name and password, just try using another phone for the pairing only.)

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Before you start pairing your smart home device with eWeLink app, please make sure, you are connected to the exact same WiFi network to which you want to pair your eWeLink smart home device.

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Some phones have a feature to use mobile data connection (via mobile carrier) and Wi-Fi at the same time, and change between them in the background to optimize for bandwidth and response time. Having multiple network connections (Wi-Fi and mobile network) at the same time may confuse problems in connecting to smart devices.

So, it’s best to fully turn OFF mobile data connection on the phone running eWeLink and just use Wi-Fi-based internet connection during the pairing to avoid problems caused by this.

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Most smart home products, including most eWeLink smart devices only support 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi channels, and are not compatible with 5 GHz new Wi-Fi routers.

Please check if your router is dual-band and also support 5 GHz Wi-Fi band. In such case, it may happen that you router offers a 5GHz Wi-Fi channel for your eWeLink device which it cannot use, and this is why paring and Wi-Fi connection fails.

More advaced routers have a capability to use a different SSID for 2.4GHz and 5GHz Wi-Fi channels. In such case, make sure you try to pair your eWeLink smart devices to the 2.4 GHz SSID.

If both channels share the same SSID name (this is no so good), we suggest you to turn off 5GHz band temporarily on your router admin page until your smart home device pairing is successfully finished.

If you do not have access to the router admin/configuration page or your router does not have such a feature to temporarily turn off 5GHz, you may try to move as far from the router as possible as a workaround. 5GHz channels normally only have a range of 5-6 meters, so moving a bit further away from it may help the smart device to connect to a 2.4GHz Wi-Fi channel. On a long run, you may also consider to have a dedicated 2.4GHz only router / subnet for your smart devices.

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A very few eWeLink devices (such as certain product versions of LED controllers and DW2 Wi-Fi door window sensors) may have a limited support for Wi-Fi standards and NOT support all 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi channels (b/g/n), only (b) for example.

On the other hand, some newer Wi-Fi routers may not support (b) channels though, so they will not be compatible.

Check Wi-Fi channel compatibility of your smart device and your router.

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Some low-end Wi-Fi routers, especially those provided by ISPs for free as part of your subcription, as well as small SIM-card based routers, may only be able to manage 10-20 Wi-Fi clients.

So it may happen that even though your phone found and configured the smart device properly, the router is not able to support one more connecting device, because of this limitation of the number of maximum connections.

We suggest you to check the router’s specification to see how many parallel connections it can handle and check the actual number of connections on the router’s admin page.

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If the pairing problem still persists, do not give up! Here is how you can quickly check if the problem is with your new smart home device, or rather on the Wi-Fi router / access point side.
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Rarely happens that the problem is on the router side: it may have a strict firewall ruleset or a MacAddress based filtering or any other incompatibility with your smart device. You may find it out by trying this:

Find another smartphone with mobile data plan for internet access, and turn on WiFi Hotspot feature on that other phone to share its mobile internet connection. Grab another phone to run eWeLink app and connect it to the first phone’s Wi-Fi hotspot. (And turn off other internet connections on that phone.)
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Now try to pair the eWeLink smart home device to the Wi-Fi hotspot of the first phone. (As Wi-Fi hotspots of phones normally have no firewall or other limitations, this is a good simulation of an open Wi-Fi network without firewalls.) If connection is successful to the phone’s Wi-Fi hotspot and connection to home Wi-Fi fails, you will know that the problem is around your router, not your smart home device.