Do you have to choose between direct binding -or- controlling them through HA, or can you still control them through HA even when they are directly bound? Because I directly paired a switch with a light before (in Philips Hue), but then wasn't able to control it through the app anymore. Since switching to HA and Zigbee2mqtt, I just used triggers with switches, but wasn't aware that direct binding is a possibility. Gonna have to look into that now :)
I configure bindings through Zigbee2MQTT. You can view the bindings in the switch configuration, where you can also update or remove them.
I use Zigbee2MQTT to handle low-level Zigbee tasks such as pairing, binding, creating groups, setting up scenes, and configuring devices. Most of these things are stored within the devices and work without the coordinator/ha-server.
The configurations you set up in Zigbee2MQTT are synced with HA and can be used there as well. I use the options provided by HA for higher-level tasks, such as automations, custom sensors, statistics, and more. Everything I configure there will not work when the server/coordinator goes down.
