Original creator of the WLED software here. There is unfortunately a DANGEROUS problem showing wiring like this to an audience of 400k+ people. This is a fire hazard. Dupont jumper cables are safe for maybe 500 mA, not 10 Amps! You'll want to use a lot thicker wiring. To make proper solderless wiring easy and safe, and prevent possible issues with intermittent LED flashing, I would highly recommend a dedicated controller like the QuinLED Dig line, or the controllers by Serg74 or Athom instead of a raw development board. It does raise the price of the project a bit, but makes it a lot safer! Other than that, thank you for the video, I highly appreciate that you chose to showcase WLED! It helps a lot of people realize how cool (and easy!) open-source lighting can be :)

OMG people DONT connect the +5V and GND to your LEDs if longer than 2ft. Connect them directly to a 5V Power Supply! Only connect the data cable to the dev board

Please, use proper cables for these amounts of Amps that are going through the cables. The data cable is fine, but the actual power cables need to be much thicker to not cause any fire hazards.

Like many are saying in the comments, you skipped over the most important thing which is understanding the power requirements, wire size, and fuses for safety. For any custom length LEDs you need to figure out the total power draw and amperage so you can size your cables properly and make sure your getting enough power. Not enough power is not a huge concern, it just means that the LEDs won't be bright or not get power at all. You only used a 50 watt power suppy which is far too low for four strips at 144 LEDs/m. Too much power and you can fry your wires. It's especially important when using the 144 LEDs/m because these things can get hot. If you had used a bigger power supply here you would have had problems, potentially a fire. I recommend people who want to try this go a find a tutorial about powering LEDs and learn all the basics first.

Put a 220 resistor on the data line. If you ramp up the length of your led strip it might fry it from the increase current draw. Also when you increase length you increase resistance so will need to have power injection lines running every 2 meters 🤙🏻

Great video! The only thing I would’ve made more clear is to not use the CAT5e cable for power. Some people might think it’d be okay to do so.

thx so much for this video - I jumped down the rabbit hole to purchase my first "fairy lights" & stumbled on BTF & WLED - what an adventure im embarked on - this is awesome! 🐰

Great video, it really helped me get started with my setup. I initially had a problem where the board was unable to communicate with the led strip. After a lot of googling I realised I needed to use the D2 pin instead of the D4 pin and everything then worked perfectly. I later found out that you can change which pin is used for data in WLED settings (In the WLED app, go to Config > LED preferences > Scroll down to Hardware Setup > Set GPIO to whichever data pin you're using, in my case it was 2.)

300 LEDs of that strip you have, at 5v running at 100% white is going to consume 65W. That works out to be 13A, you've got 500+ which is going to be more than 13A. Regardless, you're only running a 10A PSU, restricted to 8A. You've got a run of say at least 3m of CAT5, powering these. CAT5 is only 0.2mm2, and 8A at 5V for 3m requires 6.5mm2. Run this for any considerable amount of time and you're going to cause a fire. Go and check out the guides on quinled, buy one of their boards and ignore this video. You'll thank me when your house isn't in ashes

hey I would like to point out cat5e are only rated for some 600mA each strand, while the LED strip you are using is rated as 28W or 5.6A each. So using this is a solid fire hazard. generally there is no good way around this and, at 20A, the wire you should have used is at least 3mm core diameter which is a lot unless you really have a good reason, please just use 12/24V strips. I looked up the datasheet for WS2811 and its Vih is only 0.7V min so esp32 would be able to control them. btw if I remembered correct, esp32 IO high are 3v2 instead of 5v, so your strip probably also works with low IO voltages in the first place

This is awesome. I just cutout a LED strip and soldered several sections for my truck so I'm ready for the next LED project and this is exactly what I was looking for.. thanks

Plz don’t run 8 Amps through cat5e wiring unless your next light show is a fire show

This video started one hell of a rabbit hole for me

WLED in matrix mode is also excellent with some of the built-in effects supporting 2D arrays. I'm planning on using a small 8x8 matrix (like those tiny Adafruit ones) to illuminate a fibre optic bundle to make a programmable starfield ceiling.

Was a solid video, straight to the point. I’ve had a led strip but had no idea about ‘em but knew you could do stuff like this. Very no previous knowledge friendly information to understand

“I’m never buying LEDs again!” Buys different LEDS

It looks like you are using WS2812b LEDs there, I have done TONS of projects with those things. But when you cut the connector off the wires you made a BIG mistake: You left no lead-length on the connector to allow yourself to use that pigtail in the future. Granted you can buy new pigtails like that off Amazon for dirt cheap, but why not just keep a functional connector? I usually drive those LEDs with an Arduino Nano. The biggest trick is getting power to the string of LEDs, you don't want really long runs of LEDs without injecting power (5VDC) along the way. It is not just a brightness issue, it is also a functionality issue. Each LED has a tiny microprocessor, and out towards the end of a long run you could have a voltage drop big enough to make that processor crash. Also, calculate the power needed to run these LEDS at 60mA per LED (max current when full on white.) Make sure your power supply can do the job, and never take power from the Arduino (or whatever) for more than 10 of these LEDs. You should see the 12' outdoor Christmas tree we put up each year with waterproof strings of these LEDs, they are the brightest and prettiest decoration on the block, with moving and shifting colors. The power distribution is where all the strings come together at the top, easy-peasy. All the parts (except the 12' pole) come from Amazon, and there is only a little customization. You can actually get little modules from Amazon to drive the colors instead of using an Arduino.

I appreciate the warnings others have given. I wouldve delved into the safety precaution deep weeds anyways, but many wouldnt have. So as someone deathly concerned with house fire potential, I appreciate then none the less.

I’ve been meaning to do a WLED project for so long but it always seemed daunting especially when coming to power delivery. This vid made it stuuuuupid simple!

one thing you must note is that the 2nd light strip at the start might work with wled but i believe it won't have the same effects the one with red green and blue. Because, that format requires 3 n channel mosfets for it to function so it won't have the multiple different color effects

For long runs, you need to calculate the gauge of the wire for the distance to avoid voltage drop. Also you need to think about the amount of wattage going through those wires. They will get hot and melt and become a fire hazard if you run 5 amps on a 20 gauge wire no matter how close you are.

Great video. That chipset is exactly what I was looking for for my own project. Let the fun begin.

I've been toying with the idea of doing my own WLED project for some time now. This has hyped me up to go ahead and do it finally.

Before watching the video, I saw some of these comments and thought "no way he'd try to put 8 amps through a patch cable, these people are just spitting gibberish" but then he said "10 amp power supply" and then I was like "ok, well it's probably limited somewhere else" but then he bumped up the limit to 8 AMPS!!! Lemme tell ya, that is NOT a good idea. Way, way, way too much current through a 24 AWG wire. A single 24 AWG wire in the CAT 5 cabling is rated for around 2 amps (3.5 if solid core, but most network cable is stranded, and will have less current carrying capacity) according to my quick Google search. So yeah, if you push 8 amps through there, you had better keep an eye on it because it's going to heat up. Sure it's only 5 volts, but that's completely irrelevant. Current is what causes fires, not voltage. The people in the comments saying this are not trolls - this is a legitimate fire hazard. I'm not paranoid or anything, this is just a really bad idea, especially if you leave this unattended. At MINIMUM the wire must be properly sized for the current. Understand that 8 amps is a lot of current for a hobbyist project. Ideally you'd have a fuse in line for extra protection, especially if your power supply is rated higher than your cabling.

I hope an edited version gets uploaded that addresses the credible electrical concerns mentioned in the comments.

Hey Alex, Thank you for sharing this project! It is a perfect solution for a request from one of my kids! DING DONG I only wish you would have put Amazon links for the US in your description!! Thank you again!

Thank you Alix. Absolutely great video. I hope you can show us other projects with these LED..

Hi Alex. The composition of components is shocking easy. This ist what all good stuff has in common. May be a disclaimer about "think before you wire 10A" could protect yourself. But No doubt about. A super cool Idea sold with a very motivating Video. Thanks a Lot!

And using CAT5, per definition rated to max 1A current constant load at 25c, is a bad idea.

Thanks for the very informative video. Loads of really useful information and a great tutorial. Nice one Alex. 👍

Good job bro!! This stuff is gonna be dreamy once I get it all rolling!

I've used wled for years for my Christmas show it works great with xlights for controlling with radio frequency you should also use an quality external 5v powersupply and a level shifter if you are going to use super long runs of cable

I'd recommend an esp32 for wi-fi connectivity and putting another power supply on the end of the last LED strip so you don't have any voltage drop at the end.

Wled is the best way to do Christmas lights on the outside of your house but still have control over everything you can do. Already looking up and buying this for next Christmas

Simeon to me is already a stand up guy.. loved the episode.. listening and making wife breakfast on her birthday! Bless all.

I've been making my own for about 2 years and they have gotten easier and easier to make. You can also make the "ambi-light" strips for your tv where it's not just pre programed colors. They scan your tv really really fast and match the portion of your screen with the color that's in tv. So if you're watching a movie and there is an explosion you'll have behind your tv up top blue probably from the day sky on the side green from the vegetation in the scene and bottom red from the fire from the explosion. Philips and others charge you over 150 to 300 dollars for that. But with about 50 bucks you can make a simple one or for around 120 one that can process 4k and all sorts of other features.

You should use the Dig Quad.

Great Job mate! Very simple and well explained! Cheers!

Nice. Seen WLED before, might setup a couple of strips now that you've reminded me!

I got hooked on WLED about a year ago The DYI controllers are kink of a flimsy so I made my own controller . Now I keep adding adding more and more.

Show us complete noobs the power cable splicing when adding the power supply! Are you required to have strips that are IC for those effects? Thanks for the video!

Isn't it better to connect the thicker red and white lines of the LED strips directly to the power supply to not overpower the ESP - especially when connecting e.g. 20 m of strips in one line?

Perfekt. I have been looking forward to this video for a long time. I have a study project where I have to create my own smart home lamp, and I hate coding... Another thing I hate is if I have to use another app for turning the light on and off. So my main goal is to be able to set it up for Google or Apple home kit.

This video is so easy to follow along to thank you for sharing

Never knew Pete Davidson was such an expert on LEDs

I appreciate this video is tailored towards beginners but you gloss over so many important things such as power injection requirements. If you don’t know what you’re doing with electronics i wouldn’t suggest blindly following this tutorial unless you want to burn your house down

Alex. I know I am a year behind on your videos. But I have to say mate, you have been the best source on LED effect lighting solutions that I have come across so far. Thank you for putting this content out here for us to utilize. And before I forget.......Ding.....Dong.... 😂 😂

Freaking awesome thanks for the easiest instructions to install these

I think it wasn't clear from the video: Don't ever power your LEDs over the 5V pin of the ESP development board. A single WS2812B LED, which you are using here, draws up to 50 mA. For 144 LEDs per meter at half power draw (basically dimmed) this is about 3.6A. The board is not able to deliver this current continuously.

Hey @TechFlow have you ever try with a pre lit christmas tree? To change the blinking settings at the leds comes with the tree?

DingDong! Glad I came across this video! I’ll def be taking a closer look at this option as I expand the lighting throughout my house.

Wow, this is cool! Thanks for making it. I’ve got 6 segments of s Lifx beam that stopped working, but I’m pretty sure the led strips still work, it’s a software or connector issue. You think I could control them with that little doodad? I believe Lifx uses 4 wires, not 3, would that present a problem?

Why use CAT5E? The copper wire gauge is far too thin for the current you are trying to run through it.

Why is Rami Malek teaching us led strips and WLED. Just kidding haha. Thank you so much for the informative video.

ding dong. this rocks. adding it to my fav when im getting my gaming setup ready

they make breakout boards with screw terminals for the 30 and 38 pin esp32. Definitely a must buy if you want solid connections without soldering.

Please note to test power requirements set all leds to white and measure current draw 👍 You can also get 12v versions

Hey @TechFlow, great informative video, but I can't continue watching with your flashing transitions between shots! Try doing the onscreen side by side with the one-shot of you, or a smoother transition, or have no transition.

I was wondering a few days ago about how to use my Raspberry Pi Pico to do just this. Big thumbs up! It's also given me some thoughts on synchonizing Christmas LED's with music too.

Dude, this is sick! Thanks for the tutorial!

Who knew Nick from Big Mouth would know so much about lighting up your house.

I recommended Govee Lights they are super reliable and have amazing features

DUDE! I needed this video!

Really Brilliant Alex. You Made my day. Keep up your Brilliant work! Thanks

U know that your 4x144 LED strips draw 32 Amps, right? Even basic Animations will use 11 Amps, which is more than your power supply delivers. In addition, the power limit of your Ethernet cable is about 2-3 Ampere... Also, please don't cut off your power supply, you can buy a barrel connector for the other side. These connectors have their reason beyond ease of connection, they are touch-proof. In my experience, the difficulty with the esp / wled / ws8212b starts when you try to remove all the "hacky" stuff like jumper cables and have a proper setup that does not fail after ripping at a cable or burn your house down..

8A is far too much for a standard ethernet cable. Also a tip when you cut connectors, don't cut at the end, leave a bit of cable, then you can still reuse the plug later for another project.

I’ve always felt like there’s GOT to be a way someone can easily set up their own LED lights without paying Phillips Hue or Twinkly prices and your video makes exactly that possible. Thank you!!!

thx for the vid, i think i will purchase an uno r3 so i dont have to splice the 5amp. it would just plug in. u really explained the wled app very well, thanks again

It's a bit sad that it's been over a month ago now and there has been no update video, description update, pinned comment or even so much as a reply to speak of, very disappointing. It seems my lengthy technical explanation that I replied also never showed up (although it could be UKposts which killed that one). I get UKposts takes a lot of time (more then most realize) but still, this is kind of sad. :( Once again, if you want to learn, improve and do it right, always game to show you the resources to learn about doing it right and showing your audience! :)

Just wondering didn't you had to change the GPIO pin in WLED settings to 4?

Appreciate the video - great detail and easy to follow.

Esp32s are awesome. I have a drawer of them lol. Glad I found this channel. I have been wanting to make something using addressable strips to emulate fire that can be covered in cotton to look like the exhaust for a rocket on my wall.

Oof I don't know about using cat5e for the amount of power you are splicing in. Would use something lower guage to play it safe.

⚠Change the title to "You'll Never Need To Buy LEDs Again! Start A Fire With These!"⚠ Current is what causes fires, not voltage.

Mind meltingly awesome! Can't wait to build these for our studios :)

About snipping cables and extend them to get longer spacing between two segments: due to voltage drop in the data cable you will get flickering and other problems in the segment farthest away. Solve it with a sacrificial pixel or two, or three. Each pixel acts as a signal booster and repeater.

Just a note for noobs. If your board is not found on your PC try a different USB cable. There are USB cables out there with the same connectors but they are just for power. Like for a coffee cup warmer. Those have no data connection pin since coffee cups don't need data! =) Good luck LEDers!

Great video man, WLED is a great piece of software. If you ever get 12V LEDs I’d suggest using a cable other then Cat5E just to allow more current to run through as I’m pretty sure cat5e is around about 3.2Amps you can run through it and if you’ve got a run of 5m or so at 100% white then over current could cause some problems. You probably already know this but just thought I’d also mention it 🙂

Nice video!! Simple and straight to the point!!

thank you this is great! Can this be done for the outside? ie: Christmas decoration outside the border of your home (roof)? or are there specific other components should be thinking about?

This was a great video. Won't be a surprise if this becomes a new trend on UKposts, creating your own custom led strips

As others have already stated, power is taken from the wrong pin Vin is the Vin pin for the microcontroller not suitable for running an LED strip. For a long strip you MUST take account of the power consumption based on the effect you plan to run. if you run 300 LEDs on full brightness you’ll fry the regulator on the controller or worse kill the USB port on your PC/MAC. If you don’t know what your doing do not just follow this video or you’ll definitely have problems. Plus connecting LED strips to a powered micro is asking for problems. LED strips especially long runs don’t like being powered up with the data pin not connected. A series resistor in the data line and an electrolytic capacitor across the power rails is a good idea to limit transients when powering from one end of a long strip.

Ding Dong! Been making this smart home setup from 1 year. great seeing you making a video on it.

Fantastic, I've got a spare roll of network cable and five of those controller boards! Happy days, thanks for the demo 👍

How does the title "I’m Never Buying LEDs Again!" match up with the video?

Ding dong! That’s freaking awesome! Can’t wait to do this!

Hi, I love your Vid! This is exactly what I was looking for! However, I need LED's for outdoor! Which LED would you recommend for the outside? Are there also some with 144 LEDs per meter? I would like to lay the LEDs around my pool and create cool effects.

I'm never buying LEDs again, goes out and buys LEDs for WLED setup......

I got a lot of respect for you Alex, but stripping wires with scissors? Great video though, I'm loving this and never knew anything about WLED, I'm hooked already.

Wow very nice Video Thank you so much for putting this together

What a great video, super presentation! You made it really easy for all of us to config such a system! Thx! I'd never would have done it without you!

10A to this little microchip :) the roof, the roof, the roof is on fire!

How do you package up the board and the power supply, just leave it laying around on the floor?

Great video, defo getting my hands on this kit

Great video, thanks ! Question though, how do you house the ESP board ? Any recommendation for an out of the box housing box ?

sorry what 10A into a esp32?

The title has a Typo I think... If it's meant to be "WLED", you put "WELD".

Ding Dong, well done. You stayed on topic and didn't fill the video with stuff to make it longer than needed. Well done again.

Cool video. Thanks for posting such tings. Keep up the good work!

Your advice is going to lead to house fires. You should go over what gauge wires are safe for how much current.