Accommodate multiple instances of Home Assistant from the app.

[swperic]

Accommodate multiple instances of Home Assistant from the app. It would be great to be able to save multiple URLs for Home, Office, Studio and be able to get notifications from all that are "enabled". I love the iOS app!

ps. sorry I cant figure out how to tag this as a feature request

[jchasey]

Would like to second this feature request!

[robbiet480]

While we are closer to being able to implement this thanks to the overhaul done in 1.5.0, I would still have to say that it's probably pretty unlikely this ever gets implemented unless I hear a lot of feedback requesting it. And I totally understand how frustrating this is as my parents use SmartThings + Alexa which only supports one location. It would just be a ton of work to rebuild everything to support multiple locations. Apologies.

[jchasey]

Thanks for the honest feedback. Would there be an easier approach which is to have at least multiple config options and you can switch between them in the app, ie only one would be live at one time?

[robbiet480]

This is probably more trouble that it will be worth, but when we start beta testing of 2.0.0 you will be able to have the beta app and released app installed side by side without having conflicting data or any links between the two. You could set up each one for a different location.

[Scirpus22]

This is must have feature! Would love to see it in future

[Pre10der]

I would like to weigh in on this. A lot of work yes, I get it, but this has become critical for me for a couple of reasons. It can provide the ability to run discrete HA instances on seperate RPis within my own home to balance out particular functions that can’t all run on a single Pi. The app would act as an aggregation point. Additionally, i have installed multiple HA deployments across other family members homes, and we would like to to be able to share access and leverage the device-tracking integration that app provides. This is even more pertinent given that the HA user security model is moving towards a privileged based approach (users vs. administrators). So, supporting multiple instances within the app isn’t just about multiple HA deployments, it’s also about the app supporting multiple user contexts within a single HA deployment without logging in and out...painful with OTP enabled.

[maxx]

👍 for this.

one instance for home, and one for commercial.

[LAltinell]

Also want to vote up this feature! I believe this to be a crucial part of supporting the upcoming v1 release of Home Assistant. With that said, I very much respect your opinion in this matter!

[amcox]

I would also like to request this feature. I have HA installations at my vacation home as well as full time home.

Even the ability to quickly switch between instances and remember login information from within the app, rather than integrating multiple locations into one interface, would be very helpful.

Thank you.

[matteofranceschini]

Even the ability to quickly switch between instances and remember login information from within the app, rather than integrating multiple locations into one interface, would be very helpful.

This would be more than enough! I'd love that!

[nickb512]

I have finally finished migrating my house to HA from ST and was about to start migrating the other properties I look after (parents house, holiday home, mobile home) but this is a major barrier. I won’t be able to get native push notifications from my home while I’m at the holiday home?

Never thought I would say this, but I guess the others will have to stay on ST :(

[gianky69]

This would be great!

[treetopsflyer]

This request Is a critical feature. Many people who would automate a home will likely need multiple instances. Examples would be vacation home, parent’s home, business, ect. In my case it’s an airplane hangar.

The reason it’s crucial is for monitoring/notifications at a location not visited every day. Be it security, smoke, water leak, ect, many have set up HA to alert us of these critical things as a self-monitored system. Not having this ability really cripples the entire idea of automation providing peace of mind as well as control.

[jes1417]

@maxx came here for this!

[nibblerrick]

If something like switching servers will be implemented maybe it could be useful to access it with forcetouch (or however it is now named) like Blue Iris does it. I would like to see this feature.

[lindehoff]

👍 This would be a very nice feature to have

[krisnyse]

Supporting this proposal 👍

[treetopsflyer]

I agree, I don’t think the iOS app needs to combine or integrate two instances, just have the ability to switch between them.

Again, notifications from multiple instances are the most important thing here, allowing remote monitoring of homes/buildings. This really is the backbone of the entire home automation idea and adding it to the iOS app would be killer.

Any updates or ideas from the developer on this front?

[igiannakas]

Ditto, would love to be able to switch between the two instances of homeassistant I’m running on my home and my girlfriends home..

[cyrenaud]

Ditto. In my case I would like three instances integrated into the app (home, office & holiday home). I would like to easily switch between the three premises to view each separately, but need notifications from all three locations sent to the app and location tracking for each HA instance. Sounds like a lot of work, but would make this app incredibly useful. Thanks for all the work so far.

[igiannakas]

What I’ve done as a workaround is to create two web apps on my iPhone screen. It’s pretty much the same functionality wise but no notifications..

[nirkons]

Also would appreciate the feature.

Even two separate apps is a good enough solution, but its a temporary one. I just want to be able to switch between homeassistant instances like you would for example Gmail accounts in the Gmail app.

[GaryOkie]

It certainly is a must-have feature for me to be able to access primary home and lake home and receive notifications from both.

Having 2 instances of HA Companion running to accomplish this would probably suffice. Has anyone looked into using an iOS app cloner such as Parallel Space or Slices? (see: https://blogs.systweak.com/how-to-duplicate-apps-on-iphone-without-jailbreak )

[ahvink]

Yes please, I need this....

[rmooreID]

Soon I will have three instances of Home Assistant in my life. This would be a helpful feature.

[vvv850]

Same here. I manage HA in my home and one at my parents house. This would be really useful even if you need two nabu casa accounts.

[thomasja27]

👍

I have one instance for home, and one for my cabin.

[nirkons]

What I’ve done as a workaround is to create two web apps on my iPhone screen. It’s pretty much the same functionality wise but no notifications..

and no widgets..

this feature would be much appreciated

[Pre10der]

What I’ve done as a workaround is to create two web apps on my iPhone screen. It’s pretty much the same functionality wise but no notifications.. and no widgets.. this feature would be much appreciated

And in the case of iOS, no advanced location features and extended device sensors which are one of the main benefits of the app.

[Maco65]

I add my vote for this feature. If not an app maybe cloud service can "integrate" several instances into one mobile app ?

[YeomansIII]

+1 This would be beneficial for home and office.

[msgarbossa]

The notifications from multiple instances are most important for me. If I need to access another dashboard, it would be nice to use one app, but I currently just use VPN and the web UI.

To get notifications from multiple instances, I've been using the Slack integration on 2 separate instances of Home Assistant. I use one Slack workspace with separate channels for each instance. A free Slack account works for the limited use required for Home Assistant integration. Slack has a fair amount of control over notifications such as Do Not Disturb hours. Currently, I send non-critical notifications with Do Not Disturb set for off hours. I was hoping to use the Home Assistant app for critical alerts, but based on the current state of supporting multiple instances, I'm planning to further fine tune Slack.

[renhardy]

+1 for this feature.

Would be very appreciated

Thanks

[hanerd]

Plus one as well. I have 5 instances and would love to have location tracking and push notification across them

[mail4asim]

I need this too. I have two homes and one commercial location using this. Having the ability to monitor them all from my cell is really essential.

[pratesbh]

‘+ 1 for this feature.

Countermeasure was to put a link on home screen to see the second instance in Safari. Notification settings from first instance were copied to the second one, so both send notifications to the companion app. What I’m still missing is geolocation for the second instance.

[diogopms]

👍 One more, for this feature... I have 3 homeassistant installations, and I would be good if we have one 1 single application.

[ericreich]

Another vote for this. One for Home and 2nd for RV.

[The-Only-God]

Hi, I also vote for this. I have HA at Home, at work-flat and now I want to implement it at club-house, but problem with app (switching, notification and presence) is here for me. So BIG VOTE from me.

[ajuljulian]

+1 here. I have both HA and HomeKit working together at my primary home. I would’ve loved to set up HA at this second house we just purchased, but will have to limit the new house to HomeKit only if I can’t easily switch the home assistant app between houses. Or see if I can add both houses to the same network using vpn.

[LAKY911]

+1 also have 2 HA servers. Thank you

[peppemon]

+1. I use Vera (zwave) as home automation hub and in Vera there is the possibility to have multiple instances. I am switching to home assistant, and this functionality is important since I have 2 homes.

[slaeyer]

+1 here. I have HA at home, work and now in my RV. Being able to use a single app to manage all devices would be immensely useful!

[JasonRS1969]

+1

Two homes to cover, currently using iOS Home App to manage second home, but notifications and extended sensors from this app would be very beneficial for the second home (notifications in particular!).

[robbiet480]

Just wanted to say, I hear all of you, and I’m sorry but I still don’t have better news. I believe that, while this would be useful to all of you and probably hundreds more who I haven’t heard from, I don’t think anywhere close to even 5% of the 200,000 users of the app need this. Again, I’m not opposed to accepting a PR to add this but it would be a pretty big project for any one to tackle. Even after it gets implemented, it will significantly burden new feature development regarding any kind of connectivity.

A small request: Unless you have significant new info to add, please give a thumbs up on the top comment instead of adding a new comment that just says “+1”. It saves all of us from the excitement of a notification on this issue, hoping for good news, and finding out it was just someone else +1’ing this. Thanks <3

[hairychris]

@robbiet480 Is there a potential workaround? Most people seem to be perfectly happy for each instance of the app to communicate with one server and fast switching does not need to be implemented in the same app

Could we deploy a second instance of the home assistant companion app to the Apple App store? Either globally for everyone or could an individual with an Apple Dev account compile their own version? Just name it Home Assistant 2.

I know that's a disgusting hack but would it work?

[zeit0dn1]

hmmm, this is isn't good. The WAF (Wife Acceptance Factor) is going to be low if she can't use the app for both home and cabin. I was worried this would be a problem.

You might be under-estimating the need for this. I love the app and appreciate your efforts and would love it even more with multi-site capabilities.

[holman]

Is TestFlight set up for the iOS app as it exists today (and/or beta releases)? I know it was in use on the road up to 2.0, but doesn’t look like the existing links open anything up in TestFlight.

It’s not ideal, but that’d be at least one way to use two apps at once, as well as (I’m assuming) push notifications to both. That’d be a big quality of life improvement for me.

[SeanPM5]

Is TestFlight set up for the iOS app as it exists today (and/or beta releases)? I know it was in use on the road up to 2.0, but doesn’t look like the existing links open anything up in TestFlight.

There is a new TestFlight (all previous testers need to re-enroll), but it just replaces the App Store version now rather than counting as a unique / second app. So that method of running beta and stable side-by-side no longer works.

Also for everyone wanting this feature... A brand new category was launched in the Home Assistant forums where people can vote on missing features, and this is currently in the top 15 requests. https://community.home-assistant.io/t/ios-app-having-more-than-one-home-assistant/219472 For those reading this with a forum account, voting on that is also a good way to show the demand for this feature.

[tomrosenback]

+1 Having 2 instances of HA running, one for home and one for cabin