WTH Battery Device Alerts and Replacement Tracking

Month of "What the heck?!"
1

Hi everyone,

I’d like to suggest a feature enhancement for battery-powered devices in Home Assistant to make battery management more intuitive and user-friendly.

Proposed Features:

  1. Automatic Low Battery Alerts:

    • Home Assistant could send automatic notifications when a device’s battery level drops below a user-defined threshold (e.g., 20%).
    • Notifications could include reminders for critical devices (e.g., sensors, locks, or thermostats).

  2. Battery Replacement Indicator:

    • Introduce an option to mark when a battery has been replaced for a specific device.
    • Users could log the replacement manually via the device settings in the UI

  3. Replacement Tracking and Reminders:

    • Home Assistant could track the last battery replacement date and display it in the entity details.
    • Optionally, set up reminders for expected replacement intervals based on typical battery lifespans.
    • Example: “Last replaced 6 months ago. Expected lifespan: 12 months.”

  4. Battery Health Overview:

    • A dashboard card or report summarizing battery levels across all devices.
    • Highlight critical devices with low battery levels or long replacement times.

Benefits:

  • Avoids unexpected downtime for critical devices.
  • Provides peace of mind by tracking battery health across the entire smart home.
  • Simplifies battery maintenance and replacement scheduling.

Would this be a useful addition for others? Any thoughts or suggestions to refine the idea?

2
  1. This is currently possible with an automation. Check out this blueprint.
  2. Currently devices with batteries show their battery percent on the top of the device page. Having a battery level as a repair alert is a good idea, though. You can currently do this with Spook, but it is not in core.
  3. This sounds a lot like an automation you could make. Perhaps add a label to your device that contains the replacement date and use a battery percentage trigger to run your automation and make a notification.
  4. This seems possible with the current UI cards. Add an Entity Card for the battery level and make its visibility conditioned upon the battery level being below a certain threshold.
3

Have a look at the Battery Notes integration.

https://andrew-codechimp.github.io/HA-Battery-Notes/

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