60Hz Heartbeat Presence

An ESPHome configuration for the Seeed Studio MR60BHA2 mmWave Sensor Kit — a contactless vital signs and human presence detection device running on the XIAO ESP32C6.

Overview

This device uses 60GHz millimeter-wave radar to detect human presence and monitor vital signs without physical contact. It integrates directly with Home Assistant and supports Thread mesh networking.

Monitored metrics:

• Human presence (occupancy)
• Heart rate (BPM)
• Respiratory rate (breaths/min)
• Distance to detected person (cm)
• Number of targets detected
• Ambient illuminance (lux)

Hardware

Component	Description
MCU	Seeed Studio XIAO ESP32C6
mmWave Sensor	Seeed Studio MR60BHA2 (60GHz)
Light Sensor	BH1750 (I²C, 0x23)
LED	WS2812 RGB LED (single, GPIO1)

Pin Assignments

Interface	Signal	GPIO
UART (MR60BHA2)	RX	17
UART (MR60BHA2)	TX	16
I²C (BH1750)	SDA	22
I²C (BH1750)	SCL	23
LED Strip	Data	1

UART: 115200 baud, 8N1

Features

Presence-gated vital signs — Heart rate and respiratory rate sensors only publish data when a person is detected. Values reset to zero automatically when the area is vacant, preventing stale readings.

Non-invasive detection — The 60GHz radar works through non-conductive materials and requires no skin contact. Suitable for discreet installation behind walls or panels.

Thread / OpenThread support — Mesh networking capable for resilient home automation networks.

OTA updates — Firmware can be updated over-the-air via the ESPHome dashboard.

RGB status LED — Single addressable WS2812 LED, controllable from Home Assistant.

Requirements

• ESPHome ≥ 2024.3.2
• Home Assistant (for API integration)
• secrets.yaml with the following keys:

wifi_ssid: "YourNetwork"
wifi_password: "YourPassword"
api_encryption_key: "<base64-encoded 32-byte key>"
ota_password: "your-ota-password"
openthread_dataset: "<Thread TLV dataset>"  # optional

External Component

The MR60BHA2 UART driver is sourced from:

limengdu/MR60BHA2_ESPHome_external_components

ESPHome fetches this automatically at build time — no manual installation required.

Installation

1. Clone this repository.
2. Create secrets.yaml with the values above.
3. Flash the device via USB:

   esphome run heartbeat60hz.yaml
   

4. Subsequent updates can be done OTA through the ESPHome dashboard or CLI.

After flashing, the device will appear in Home Assistant via mDNS auto-discovery.

Home Assistant Entities

Once adopted, the following entities are available:

Entity	Type	Unit
Occupancy	Binary Sensor	—
Heart Rate	Sensor	BPM
Respiratory Rate	Sensor	BPM
Distance	Sensor	cm
Target Count	Sensor	—
Illuminance	Sensor	lx
RGB LED	Light	—

Fallback Access Point

If Wi-Fi is unavailable, the device broadcasts a fallback hotspot:

• SSID: seeedstudio-mr60bha2
• IP: 192.168.4.1

Use this to reconfigure Wi-Fi credentials via the ESPHome captive portal.

Project Info

Field	Value
Device name	heartbeat60hz
ESPHome project	seeedstudio.mr60bha2_kit v3.5
Framework	ESP-IDF
Min ESPHome	2024.3.2