Question

Just wondering if it’s possible to have people are present in the house through the phones connecting to the WiFi? Maybe by flashing my router?  

Answer 1

I use Life 360.  

Comments

@livonia534 Yh I though that but doesn’t it use ur gps running 24/7?  

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@maccaboy Nope, don't notice much battery drain.  

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Believe it or not your GPS is probably already running 24/7 anyway.  

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@anatolia7046 .  
https://life360.helpshift.com/a/lif...ator/

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If I'm in the car I have it plugged into Android Auto and a usually using Waze anyways.  

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@livonia534 exactly

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@livonia534 definitely worth a look then try that method out just got to persuade the other half  

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Most of these apps use geofences which do NOT keep the GPS on 24/7. Geofences are registered with the phone's OS. Android/iOS will then wake up an app in the background if it thinks the phone has entered/exited a geofence based on cell towers, wifi networks nearby, and maybe GPS.  

Answer 2

+1 for Life360. I even have it set up to open or close my garage door automatically when Life360 says my family arrive home.  

Comments

Mine closes the garage door if it's open when leaving and unlocks my front door when I arrive.  

Answer 3

Life360 linked to smartthings! It is the best I think

Answer 4

It’s really a good question. Both Life360 and the ST native presence sensors seem to go offline occasionally. Plus now Apple keeps asking more frequently if these can keep using gps in the background and thus risk being turned off by the family . I’d love to have presence established by being on the wifi (hey, it works for my dog’s Whistle ). Simplest approach is best . But I suspect that doesn’t exist?  

Comments

@studio take a look at Fing Box. It has a Digital Fence feature that detects any WiFi device connecting to your home network, or even just present but not connected.  

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Thanks - yes, that would do it, but apparently no native integration with ST. Possibly via IFTTT, but that can be pretty delayed.  

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Trying my TP-Link Deco mesh network through IFTTT. Seems to respond quickly to devices coming/leaving - a few seconds.  

Answer 5

You can do it with some Asus router + IFTTT

Answer 6

+1 Life360

Answer 7

Our router can inform ST via IFTTT of devices connecting and disconnecting - Like our phones. So that's an easy way to handle presence, but Life360 is easier and doesn't rely on IFTTT at all.  

Answer 8

I used AsusWRT directly flipping virtual presence sensors on ST - search for "Asus presence" on the community site. It's quite a simple script and easily adapted to other routers, it just uses a mechanism to scan for devices, match them to a list and send web requests if anything has changed. Since then I picked up a Deco mesh network which does the same via IFTTT and webhooks (I use the same virtual sensors on ST to make it easy). Beware though, some IFTTT compatible routers only notify on connection, not disconnection. Deco does both.