Appliance Auto Notify¶
Automatic notifications for household appliances in Home Assistant, with no automations or YAML.
When a dishwasher, washing machine, oven or other appliance starts a cycle, you're told it started, your phone shows a Live Activity with progress and time remaining while it runs, and you're told when it finishes.
This is an early version to try with real appliances. It supports Bosch, Neff and Siemens appliances connected with the Home Assistant Home Connect integration, in English only. Any other appliance can be added by hand if it has a power monitor, such as a smart plug.
What You Need¶
- Home Assistant 2026.7 or later
- An appliance set up with the Home Connect integration, or one with a power sensor
- Supernotify, installed from HACS, for Live Activities and for anything beyond a plain notification
- Home Assistant app installed on an Apple mobile device, minimum iOS 17.2, or on an Android one, where a Live Update needs Android 16 or later, and earlier versions show an ordinary notification with a progress bar
Without Supernotify, it only sends a start and an end notification, to every phone with the Home Assistant app unless you choose other notify entities.
Install¶
- Use the button above, or in HACS add
https://github.com/rhizomatics/appliance_autonotifyas a custom repository of type Integration, then install Appliance Auto Notify and restart Home Assistant - In Settings, Devices & services, choose Add integration and pick Appliance Auto Notify
- Leave Set up appliances automatically on, and submit
That's all. Every Home Connect appliance is set up straight away, and so is any you add later. Each is listed on the integration's page, alongside Automatic discovery, and notifies with no further settings.
To stop the notifications for an appliance, disable it rather than delete it, since a deleted appliance is found and set up again.
Choosing Appliances Yourself¶
Turn Set up appliances automatically off, on the first screen or later from the settings of Automatic discovery, and appliances are instead offered as Discovered on the Devices & services page. Choose Add to set one up, or Ignore on any you don't want.
Power Monitored Appliances¶
An appliance with no supported integration can be added if a sensor measures the power it draws.
- On the integration's page, choose Add service
- Give the appliance a name, and choose its power sensor
| Setting | Default | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Power threshold | 1 W | The appliance is running while it draws more than this |
| Grace period | 60 seconds | How long power must stay at or below the threshold before the cycle is over, so short drop outs are ignored |
| Minimum running time | 0 seconds | How long power must have been above the threshold before it counts as a cycle, so a door opened or a button pressed is ignored |
| Smart plug | None | The switch the appliance is plugged into, offered as a button on the end notification to switch it off |
Raise the grace period for appliances that pause mid-cycle, such as a washing machine soaking. Set a minimum running time, 60 seconds or so, for appliances that draw a little power when their door is opened or a button pressed, such as a dishwasher whose light comes on, so that isn't notified as a cycle. Time above the threshold adds up across drop outs shorter than the grace period, so a cycle that pauses as it starts still counts.
Settings¶
Nothing needs changing for notifications to work. Each appliance on the integration's page has settings: Notify start and Notify end switches, the start off and the end on by default, for an oven a Notify phases switch, on by default, a Notify progress switch, off by default, with Supernotify a Program in title switch, on by default, a Dashboard to open when a notification or the Live Activity is tapped, and then three sections that start closed. With Notify start or Notify end off, that notification isn't sent, but the Live Activity is still opened and closed, silently and on phones only. The dashboard is a choice of those in Home Assistant, never a URL to type in, so a notification can't be made to open anything else.
| Section | What it does |
|---|---|
| Start message | The title and message sent when the appliance starts, shown as they'll be sent, such as "Dishwasher started". Clear a box to go back to the usual wording. {program} is replaced by the program under way, as Home Assistant shows it, such as "Eco 50ºC", and by nothing for an appliance that reports none |
| End message | The same for when it finishes, such as "Dishwasher is finished". With Supernotify, also a Reminder, see below |
| Notification targets | With Supernotify, Targets is the same choice of entities, devices, areas, floors and labels as any Supernotify notification, Custom targets is for those outside Home Assistant, such as e-mail addresses or phone numbers, and Deliveries limits notifications to those chosen. Leave them empty for Supernotify to choose. Without Supernotify, Targets is a choice of notify entities, and left empty means every phone with the Home Assistant app |
With Program in title on, a Live Activity that has a time left to show is titled with the program beside the name, such as "Dishwasher · Eco 50ºC", since on the Lock Screen of an iPhone the timer takes the place of the message, which is where the program otherwise goes. Turn it off if the program names of an appliance are too long to fit.
What Gets Sent¶
| When | With Supernotify | Without |
|---|---|---|
| Cycle starts | A Live Activity opened silently on phones. With Notify start on, a start notification everywhere, which opens the Live Activity too | Nothing, or with Notify start on, a start notification |
| Every 5% of progress | Silent update of the Live Activity, on phones only, with the program under way as its message, such as "Eco 50ºC". With Notify progress on, a notification everywhere instead at every 10%, which updates the Live Activity too | Nothing, or with Notify progress on, a notification |
| Every 2% of progress, from 90% | Silent update of the Live Activity, on phones only | Nothing |
| Oven warming up | Silent update of the Live Activity as the oven warms, see below | Nothing, or with Notify progress on, a notification |
| Oven up to heat | "Oven is pre-heated" everywhere, unless Notify phases is off | The same notification, unless Notify phases is off |
| Cycle finishes | Live Activity closed, then an end notification everywhere, unless Notify end is off | End notification, unless Notify end is off |
| Cycle is aborted, or fails | Live Activity closed, with no end notification | Nothing |
Pausing and resuming an appliance counts as the same cycle. An appliance that is switched off, like an oven, counts as finished.
Buttons on the End Notification¶
With Supernotify, the end notification has buttons, in the language of Home Assistant where there's a translation (English and Italian so far):
| Button | What it does |
|---|---|
| Finished | Acknowledges and clears the notification, and stops any reminder |
| Remind Later | Sends the end notification again later, after the Reminder minutes or, with none set, 30 |
| Switch Off | Only for a power monitored appliance with a Smart plug chosen, and the Switch Off button setting left on. Switches it off, unless a new cycle has started since |
With a Reminder set in the End message section, the end notification is sent again after that many minutes, up to the Reminder repeats times, 3 unless changed, until Finished is pressed or the next cycle starts. Supernotify adds the buttons of its own scenarios after these, and Android shows only the first 3.
Oven Pre-heating¶
An oven with no timer set has no progress to report, so while it warms up, on any program, the bar is its temperature as a percentage of the one it's set to, and the message is the two of them, such as "Pre-heating, 150 of 200°C", or "Fast pre-heat" in place of "Pre-heating" while that is on.
Once the oven is as hot as asked for, or reports that pre-heating is finished, "Oven is pre-heated" is sent everywhere as a notification of its own, unless Notify phases is off. The Live Activity stays until the oven is switched off, and goes straight on to the program and the temperature, such as "Pizza setting, 200°C", updated whenever the temperature has moved by 5 degrees. From then on the oven isn't taken to be warming up again, however its temperature wanders, until it has been off. With a timer set, the bar then goes on to the progress of the program.
Icons¶
The icon of a notification follows the type of appliance: dishwasher, washer, dryer, washer dryer, oven, hob, hood, coffee maker, cleaning robot or air conditioner. A power monitored appliance has none to go by, so its name is used instead, as in "Washer" or "Kettle".
Known Limits¶
- On a Samsung phone, the status bar chip, the Now Bar and the appliance's colour only show with the developer option Live notifications for all apps turned on. See Android and iOS for everything each platform shows
-
On Android the notifications go in their own Appliances channel, made with sound the first time, since a Live Update in the app's usual channel is silent. Its sound can be changed in the phone's settings for the Home Assistant app, and is kept from then on
-
Pre-heating is the only phase of a cycle there is to tell of, since Home Connect reports none for a dishwasher or washer, such as pre-wash or rinse
-
If the appliance never reports the end of its cycle, the Live Activity stays on the phone until dismissed
- If Home Assistant restarts mid-cycle, the end is still notified and the Live Activity closed
- An appliance that stops without saying it has finished or been switched off is taken to be finished 10 seconds later, in case it carries on, as an oven does when its settings are changed
- An oven has no pre-heating bar until Home Connect first reports its temperature, which isn't known after a restart of Home Assistant until the oven is next heating
- Progress, time remaining and the program are only shown where the appliance reports them, so never for a power monitored appliance
- If Home Assistant restarts while an oven is on, it isn't shown as pre-heating, since there's no knowing whether it has been up to heat, only with its program and temperature
- An oven with no timer set reports its progress as 100%, so that is what the bar shows once it's up to heat
Known Issues¶
Both of these have been seen on an iPhone, and neither has a confirmed cause yet.
Progress bar behind the appliance¶
The progress bar of the Live Activity can fall well behind, such as showing 40% while the appliance is at 74%.
The likely cause is iOS. Progress is sent with silent: true, so that the phone doesn't alert every 5%, and the Companion App sends silent updates at a lower priority, which iOS may delay, batch or drop. This is a theory, since it hasn't been tested by sending the updates without silent.
Turning on Notify progress sends each update as an ordinary notification, without silent, so is worth trying if the bar matters more than the interruptions.
Seconds shown as dashes¶
The time remaining sometimes has dashes in place of the seconds, such as 52:-- or 1:30:--, on the Lock Screen while the Dynamic Island shows a full countdown at the same moment.
The same finish time is sent however it ends up shown, and the Companion App has no setting for the format of the timer, so this is down to the phone. The likely reason is that the Lock Screen is redrawn less often while it's dimmed or always-on, so drops the seconds. This is also a theory, and nothing has been found that changes it.
Development¶
uv sync
uv run pytest
uv run ruff check --fix && uv run ruff format
uv run mypy custom_components/appliance_autonotify
This component is an implementation of RFC-0004 from Supernotify