See my comparison video last year, when the Mini PC was cheaper: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TORg5FhKf-4And Happy New Year! Hope the rest of 2026 has mor...
You almost certainly could do it with an ESP32 (a microcontroller with Arduino support and which supports WiFi and bluetooth).
An ESP32 Super Mini board costs about $5.
Of course, forget about an UI other than web-based for the ESP32 or proper OS (like Linux) support, as that stuff is on the embedded systems side of things (though kinda powerful for one) rather than the Single Board Computer side.
I use a little 3b for home automation stuff. That little guy is arguably overkill for controlling a thermostat and some other silly things.
You almost certainly could do it with an ESP32 (a microcontroller with Arduino support and which supports WiFi and bluetooth).
An ESP32 Super Mini board costs about $5.
Of course, forget about an UI other than web-based for the ESP32 or proper OS (like Linux) support, as that stuff is on the embedded systems side of things (though kinda powerful for one) rather than the Single Board Computer side.