Energy Monitoring Smart Plugs without Relays — Actually a Sensible Idea?

Published at : 18 Dec 2025

In today's video we take a look at a couple of devices that can be used to monitor the power consumption of individual appliances, but don't contain a relay - meaning that they can't turn devices off which eliminates a pretty major point of failure for scenarios where you only want power monitoring! In particular, we'll take a look at the No-Relay version of IoTorero's ESPHome smart plug and the Shelly PM Mini Gen3. Both of these allow power monitoring of connected appliances and fully local Home Assistant integration while not containing any sort of relay!

- Buy the Shelly PM Mini Gen3 on Amazon (Affiliate): https://geni.us/6zopug
- Buy the IoTorero No-Relay Smart Plug on AliExpress (Affiliate): https://geni.us/NGZ5p

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Chapters:
00:00 - Introduction
00:52 - Why Wouldn't You Want a Relay?
04:55 - IoTorero No-Relay Smart Plug Tour
07:53 - A Look Inside the IoTorero Plug
12:53 - Smart Plug Setup & Home Assistant Integration
13:29 - Testing The IoTorero Power Monitoring
18:38 - Connecting Some Appliances
22:49 - Looking at the Data in Home Assistant
29:42 - Shelly PM Mini Gen3 Tour
34:15 - A Potential Limitation
36:47 - Conclusion

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