Gaming Room Lighting Based on PC State in Home Assistant

Status: Draft

Last tested: TBD

Works with: Home Assistant, smart lights, PC presence/state sensor

Category: Smart Home / Gaming

Difficulty: Intermediate

Problem

Gaming rooms often have smart lights, but manual scene switching gets old. Home Assistant can change lighting based on whether the gaming PC is active.

What you will build

A simple automation that switches a room to a gaming scene when a PC becomes active, then restores normal lighting when the PC turns off.

Requirements

Home Assistant
Smart lights or scenes
PC state signal such as ping sensor, MQTT, Home Assistant companion app, or smart plug power draw

Quick version

alias: Gaming room scene when PC active
trigger:
  - platform: state
    entity_id: binary_sensor.gaming_pc_active
    to: "on"
action:
  - service: scene.turn_on
    target:
      entity_id: scene.gaming_room_focus
mode: single

Step-by-step setup

Step 1: Create a PC active sensor

Options:

Ping sensor for basic online/offline
Smart plug power threshold for actual usage
MQTT signal from the PC
Home Assistant companion app sensor

Step 2: Create scenes

Create at least two scenes:

`scene.gaming_room_focus`
`scene.gaming_room_normal`

Step 3: Create active automation

Turn on the gaming scene when the PC active sensor turns on.

Step 4: Create restore automation

alias: Restore room lighting when PC inactive
trigger:
  - platform: state
    entity_id: binary_sensor.gaming_pc_active
    to: "off"
    for: "00:10:00"
action:
  - service: scene.turn_on
    target:
      entity_id: scene.gaming_room_normal
mode: single

Verification

PC active sensor changes state correctly.
Gaming scene activates once.
Normal scene returns after the cooldown.

Troubleshooting

| Symptom | Likely cause | Fix |

| --- | --- | --- |

| Lights change when PC wakes briefly | Sensor too sensitive | Add `for:` delay or power threshold |

| Scene never activates | Wrong entity ID | Check Developer Tools -> States |

| Scene overrides manual changes | Automation too aggressive | Add time windows or manual override helper |

Optional upgrades

Detect specific games and choose matching scenes.
Add bias lighting behind the monitor.
Disable automation during daytime.
Add a manual override toggle.