Local-push Home Assistant integration for MAK Pellet Boss WiFi grills. No cloud dependency — the grill talks directly to your HA instance over your LAN.

MAK Grills has closed its doors, but your grill still works. This integration keeps your Pellet Boss WiFi connected — locally, forever — with no cloud required.

The Pellet Boss WiFi controller POSTs telemetry to makgrillsmobile.com every few seconds while running. This integration registers that same HTTP endpoint on your Home Assistant instance. A local DNS rewrite redirects the grill's traffic to HA instead of the (now-defunct) MAK cloud, giving you real-time local control with zero internet dependency.

┌──────────┐   POST /GrillService/Service   ┌──────────────────┐
│ MAK Grill │ ─────────────────────────────► │ Home Assistant    │
│ Pellet    │ ◄───────────────────────────── │ (your LAN)       │
│ Boss WiFi │   setPoint, cookMode, power    │                  │
└──────────┘                                 └──────────────────┘
     DNS rewrite: makgrillsmobile.com → your HA IP

• Real-time telemetry — pit temp, 3 meat probes, power state, grill flags
• Full control — setpoint, cook mode (Smoke/Grill/Sear), zone probe, power on/off
• Safety — flameout detection, cooldown interlock, auto-sync setpoint from pit temp
• Diagnostics — last seen timestamp, POST count, grill ID, raw flags
• Local push — no polling, no cloud, no latency
• 60-second timeout — no more flickering disconnected status between slow POSTs

After installing, go to Settings → Devices → MAK Grill and press the Create Dashboard button. A fully configured dashboard appears in your sidebar with pit temperature gauge, controls, probes, cook history graph, status, and safety/diagnostics cards.

Want to build your own instead? See the Dashboard Guide for copy-paste YAML for each card.

1. Open HACS in Home Assistant
2. Click the three dots menu → Custom repositories
3. Add https://github.com/papac0rn/ha-mak-grill with category Integration
4. Search for "MAK Grill" and install
5. Restart Home Assistant

Copy the custom_components/mak_grill folder to your Home Assistant config/custom_components/ directory and restart.

Point makgrillsmobile.com to your Home Assistant IP on your router. The Pellet Boss controller resolves this hostname to find its server.

Example (TP-Link Omada / ER8411):

• Go to your router's DNS settings
• Add a static DNS entry: makgrillsmobile.com → 192.168.1.200 (your HA IP)

Example (Pi-hole / AdGuard Home):

• Add a DNS rewrite: makgrillsmobile.com → your HA IP

Pro tip: If your grill is on a separate IoT VLAN, consider adding a firewall rule to block the grill from reaching external DNS servers. This forces it to use your router's DNS (with the rewrite) and makes the connection bulletproof.

1. Go to Settings → Devices & Services → Add Integration
2. Search for MAK Grill
3. Enter a name for your grill
4. Done — entities appear immediately

Power on your grill. Within a few seconds, binary_sensor.mak_grill_connected should turn ON and temperature sensors should populate.

You can also test with curl:

curl -X POST -d "GrillId=TEST&Temp=275&Power=ON&Probe1=165&Probe2=0&Probe3=0&GrillFlags=ATSET" http://YOUR_HA_IP/GrillService/Service

The Pellet Boss WiFi controller sends form-encoded POSTs with these fields:

The integration responds with a quoted command string that sets the grill's operating parameters:

"setPoint=225&potStatus=&cookMode=1&zoneProbe=1&power=1"

• Auto-sync setpoint: On first connection, the integration syncs the HA setpoint to the grill's actual pit temperature — no more accidentally commanding 500°F when the grill is at 225°F
• User-set tracking: The integration only sends commands you explicitly set in HA. It never overrides the grill's own settings unless you ask it to.
• Cooldown interlock: You can't power on a grill that's in cooldown mode
• Flameout detection: Once the grill has come up to temperature, alerts if the pit stays 35°F+ below the setpoint for 8 minutes. A MAK holds about 450°F at most, so a higher setpoint is judged against 450°F. A cook that never reaches temperature within 45 minutes (a failed light) also counts as a flameout.

binary_sensor.mak_grill_at_setpoint follows the grill's own ATSET flag. A grill set above about 450°F may never report it, so the example below also fires when the pit gets within 5°F of the setpoint (capped at 450°F).

It sends one alert per setpoint per cook, so lid-open dips on a long smoke don't re-alert. Power State keeps its last value (for example COOLDOWN) between cooks, so the alert re-arms when the grill goes to START, or to ON from any other state. Create a toggle helper named MAK Grill set point alert sent first, then replace mobile_app_your_phone with your phone's notify service. On Android, channel: alarm_stream makes it beep even when the phone is on silent.

alias: MAK Grill - at set point alert
mode: queued
triggers:
  - trigger: state
    entity_id: sensor.mak_grill_power_state
    to: "START"
    id: rearm
  - trigger: state
    entity_id: sensor.mak_grill_power_state
    to: "ON"
    not_from: ["ON", unknown, unavailable]
    id: rearm
  - trigger: state
    entity_id: number.mak_grill_setpoint
    not_from: [unknown, unavailable]
    not_to: [unknown, unavailable]
    for: { seconds: 15 }
    id: rearm
  - trigger: state
    entity_id: binary_sensor.mak_grill_at_setpoint
    from: "off"
    to: "on"
    id: atset
  - trigger: template
    value_template: >
      {% set raw = states('number.mak_grill_setpoint') | float(0) %}
      {% set sp = [raw, 450] | min %}
      {{ raw >= 160 and is_state('sensor.mak_grill_power_state', 'ON')
         and states('sensor.mak_grill_temperature') | is_number
         and (states('sensor.mak_grill_temperature') | float) >= sp - 5 }}
    for: { seconds: 30 }
    id: temp
actions:
  - choose:
      - conditions:
          - condition: trigger
            id: rearm
        sequence:
          - action: input_boolean.turn_off
            target: { entity_id: input_boolean.mak_grill_set_point_alert_sent }
      - conditions:
          - condition: trigger
            id: [atset, temp]
          - condition: state
            entity_id: sensor.mak_grill_power_state
            state: "ON"
          - condition: state
            entity_id: input_boolean.mak_grill_set_point_alert_sent
            state: "off"
        sequence:
          - action: input_boolean.turn_on
            target: { entity_id: input_boolean.mak_grill_set_point_alert_sent }
          - action: notify.mobile_app_your_phone
            data:
              title: MAK Grill is up to temp
              message: >
                Pit {{ states('sensor.mak_grill_temperature') | float(0) | round(0) | int }}°F
                (setpoint {{ states('number.mak_grill_setpoint') | int(0) }}°F)
              data:
                ttl: 0
                priority: high
                channel: alarm_stream
                tag: mak_grill_setpoint

• Grill Buddy — "Alert me when probe 1 hits 203°F" — works with any HA temperature sensor, including the ones this integration provides
• meater-in-local-haos — Local-first cooking assistant for HA with guided cooks, AI recipe building, and cook history — just point it at your MAK Grill probe entities

For more help, see the Troubleshooting wiki page or open an issue.

• bawilson2 — Original protocol reverse-engineering and mak-controller Docker container that proved local control was possible. This integration wouldn't exist without that groundwork.
• Built with Claude Code

MIT