Heads-up

For Android Alerts from Home Assistant, each the way it deserves.

Heads-up is an Android app for people who run Home Assistant at home. It turns Home Assistant's notifications into alerts that behave the way each one deserves: a gentle tone when the washing machine is done, an alarm that sounds through silent mode when the smoke detector goes off, a wake-up alarm in the morning.

What it does

  • Profiles, made in Home Assistant. You decide how each kind of alert behaves: its sound and vibration, whether it plays through the alarm volume so it sounds when the phone is on silent, whether it breaks through Do Not Disturb, whether it shows a full-screen alarm on the lock screen, and which buttons it has. Every linked phone follows.
  • Fast at home. On your home network the phone keeps a direct, encrypted connection to Home Assistant, so alerts arrive within a moment, even when the internet is down.
  • Away from home too. Alerts then come through Google's push service, end to end encrypted, so nobody but your Home Assistant and your phone can read them.
  • Snooze, and nothing rings forever. A snoozed alarm rings again on time, also after the phone restarts. An alarm nobody answers snoozes itself a few times and then stays as a silent "Missed" notification.
  • Made for automations. Pick a phone or all phones, choose a profile and add the current state of any entity. Button taps, snoozes and alarms nobody answered come back to Home Assistant as events.

Setting it up

There is no account and no login. You install the Heads-up integration in Home Assistant, open the app on your home Wi-Fi, pick your Home Assistant and add the phone there. Both screens show the same six digit code, so you know the phone is linked to your own Home Assistant and nothing sits in between.

Free and subscription

Linking a phone and setting it up is free, and so are the first 10 notifications at home, to try the app. A subscription gives unlimited notifications, at home and away. It starts with a free trial, and one subscription covers every phone signed in with the same Google account.

Good to know

  • Heads-up needs Android 8 or newer, and Home Assistant with the Heads-up integration.
  • Heads-up is not made by or affiliated with the Home Assistant project.
  • There is no advertising and no tracking. The privacy policy explains in full what the app keeps and what leaves your phone.