Why are people always detected in a zone?

Configuration
1

I have installed the official mobile app on my phone and my wife’s phone. We both have OnePlus android phones and do not currently use Home Assistant Cloud.

I assumed that the Home Assistant server would be able to work out that if it can ping the mobile app, then it must be at home, else it must be not at home, or at very least unknown. Unfortunately, instead, it just permanently gives a false positive of both mobile apps being at home. For example, my wife is currently in a different county, but Home Assistant insists that she is at home.

Instead, as a workaround, I have been able to add the WiFi Connection entity from device Diagnostic. If the state of this is equal to our home WiFi SSID, this gives a true positive that the device is at home. If it is something else or Unknown, then it is not in the house. This appears to work, but it does feel like a more circuitous route, when this functionality is supposed to be built into the app.

What am I doing wrong here?

Thanks!

2

That’s not how it works. The app reports to HA, not the other way around.

It sounds like you don’t have working remote access configured - either in the app or in general.

3

Right enough, I have not set up remote access. I (foolishly) assumed that the app would be able to work out when it was on the home network. Guess I will stick with testing for the WiFi connection.

4

Well, the app can if you tell it what the home WiFi network is, but if you haven’t set up remote access it can’t communicate when not at home.

5

Ensure you have the location sensors enabled, for some reason my wifes phone showed the geolocation correctly, but it always showed at Home.

I can’t remember which one it was, but I can tell you what I have enabled now :slight_smile:

BackGround Location = Enabled
High Accuracy Mode = Disabled
High Accuracy Update Interval = Disabled
Location Zone = Enabled <— Problably this one ?
Single Accurate Location = Enabled