Smartify your Washing Machine

My washing machine is in the basement. I kept forgetting it was done. The fix took about an hour.

The hardware

A smart power socket with energy monitoring — measures watts, volts, and current in real time. I flashed it with Tasmota for local MQTT control (no cloud, no app required). Plugged the machine in, connected it to Home Assistant over MQTT.

Reading the machine’s state

A washing machine has a distinctive power pattern. During the wash cycle it draws 500–2000W depending on the heating element. During spin it spikes briefly. When it’s done, it drops to near zero.

Home Assistant gets the live wattage from Tasmota via MQTT. That’s enough signal to work with.

The automation

One rule: if power drops below 5W and stays there for 3 minutes, send a notification.

The 3-minute delay filters out brief pauses between wash phases. 5W sits comfortably above standby noise but below anything active.

Cost

One €15 smart plug. About an hour of setup. Zero forgotten wet clothes since.

This is what I like about Home Assistant: the building blocks are already there — MQTT sensor, threshold trigger, push notification. You’re just wiring them together. No custom code, no cloud dependency, no subscription.