The software behind your smart home just got smarter

Most clients never ask about the software. That's fair — you hired someone to handle it. But the tool that sits at the center of every KNX installation just received a significant update, and a few of the changes are worth understanding because they affect how your project gets built and what happens after handover.

ETS6.4 was released in March 2026. If you've had a KNX installation done in the past few years, this is the software that was used to program it. Every device on your bus — every switch, actuator, sensor, thermostat — gets its instructions written in ETS. The commissioning process is where the logic gets loaded onto the hardware. It's where the design on paper becomes a system that actually works.

The problem with commissioning time

One of the realities of KNX that clients don't always see is how much of commissioning is repetitive work. You're linking group addresses to communication objects — in plain terms, telling device A to respond when device B sends a signal. On a mid-size residential installation, you can have several hundred of these links. On a large property, more.

In earlier versions of ETS, each link was a separate operation. One by one. In ETS6.4, multi-linking changes this. You select multiple group addresses, hold Alt, and link them all in a single step. It sounds like a small thing. For a 400-link project, it isn't. It compresses hours of work and, more importantly, reduces the margin for error that comes with repetitive manual tasks.

Clean commissioning means a cleaner system. A system that does exactly what was designed, without leftover test addresses or mislinked objects from someone working at speed under site pressure.

Physical access to devices is no longer always necessary

This one matters more than it might sound.

In previous versions, downloading a program to a KNX device typically required physically pressing the programming button on the device itself. For a light switch in an accessible position, that's fine. For an actuator tucked inside a ceiling void or a meter cupboard that's been half-closed, it's a problem.

ETS6 introduced download via serial number as a workaround — you could identify a device by its serial number and push the download without touching the button. In ETS6.4, this is now the default behaviour. When a device's serial number is known, ETS automatically uses it. You don't have to switch modes or remember to set it per device.

In practice this means commissioning on a finished or near-finished site is less disruptive. The ceiling doesn't need to come down again. The electrical board doesn't need to be fully open for the whole session. The process is quieter and faster, which matters on a building site where other trades are still working.

Automatic backups — small feature, significant risk reduction

KNX projects are complex files. They carry the full logic of your installation: every device, every group address, every parameter that was set at commissioning. If that file is lost or corrupted without a current backup, recovering the project from scratch is a serious job.

In ETS6.4, automatic backups are now built in. Once you define an archive location, ETS creates a new backup version every time the project is closed. It happens quietly, without any action required.

This is especially relevant since the introduction of KNX Secure. A secured installation requires the project file with the correct security keys. Without it, reprogramming the system later is substantially more difficult. Automatic backups close that gap in a way that relying on manual discipline never quite did.

For clients, this means any installer running ETS6.4 has one less reason to not have a current backup of your project file.

Firmware updates without separate apps

Until recently, updating device firmware in a KNX installation typically required a manufacturer-specific ETS App — a third-party plugin that handled the update outside of the main software. In ETS6.4, the foundation for native firmware updates is built directly into ETS.

As manufacturers update their devices to support this mechanism, firmware can be maintained from within ETS itself, without additional software. It's the kind of improvement that doesn't make headlines today but reduces friction significantly over a system's lifespan — particularly relevant when security patches need to be applied across a full installation without a multi-step process for each device type.

What this means if you're planning a project now

Nothing in ETS6.4 changes what KNX can do. The bus architecture, the open standard, the hardware — all of that stays the same. What changes is the quality and efficiency of the commissioning process.

For a client, the practical implications are: less commissioning time on site, lower risk of programming errors, cleaner project documentation, and better long-term maintenance. These aren't dramatic claims. They're the result of a software team making the daily work of a KNX programmer noticeably better, version by version.

If you're in the planning stage of a new build or renovation, it's worth knowing that the tool your installer is working with now is meaningfully better than it was two years ago. The standard for what a well-commissioned KNX installation looks like has moved, and continues to move.

Worth a conversation if you're trying to understand what you should expect from the process.

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wayne@knxlogic.co.za | 082 564 3982 | www.knxlogic.co.za