ESPHome Device Manager for iOS — an easier way to live with ESPHome

ESPHome
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Hey folks! I’ve been working on a small iOS app to make ESPHome a lot more approachable for family members and anyone who doesn’t want to poke YAML or IPs all day.

Meet ESPHome Device Manager for iPhone and iPad — now on the App Store:

What it does

  • Auto-discovers ESPHome devices on your network (Bonjour/mDNS). No typing IPs.

  • Shows a clean device overview: name, IP, last seen, and whether the web server is running.

  • Pulls a list of components/entities per device and their current state.

  • One-tap controls for common components (switches, lights, fans, covers, numbers, selects, etc.).

  • Periodic refresh and pull-to-refresh to keep states up to date.

  • Manual add by IP/port if discovery is blocked, plus HTTP basic auth support.

  • Optional organizing: group, reorder, or hide components for each device (great for simplifying for non-technical users).

Make it great: enable component listing

For the best experience, please install the “listcomponents” web_server extension on your devices. It exposes a /components endpoint that the app reads to accurately list and control entities.

Add this to your ESPHome YAML (keep your existing web_server: settings):

external_components:
  - source: github://domgrimm/esphome-webserver-listcomponents
    components: ["webserver_listcomponents"]

# Enable the built-in web server (required)
web_server:

# Enable the list components component
webserver_listcomponents:

It works without the extension (the app falls back to the REST API and some lightweight HTML parsing), but with listcomponents everything is faster, more reliable, and more complete — especially for non-technical users who just want a simple list of “things” to tap.

Why it helps non-technical users

  • No Home Assistant setup required to see/control what’s on the device.

  • Friendly names and grouped sections keep the screen focused on what matters.

  • Clear “No web server running” hints so you know what’s missing.

  • “Fallback AP” detection with a built-in link to the device’s captive portal when you need to fix Wi‑Fi.

If you’ve got ideas or feedback, I’d love to hear it!

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