HomeKit Automations & Shortcuts EXPLAINED - HomeKit 101 

One of my favorite personal automation - I have my desk iPad always plugged in but I don't always want it charging. So, it's plugged into a smart plug and when the battery level goes below 15% the plug will power on and start recharging the iPad. Once the iPad battery level is over 95% the smart plug powers off. It's a good way to make sure the iPad always has power but not always charging.

Shortcuts are really powerful, but can be daunting. You explain them in a simple way. Good stuff!!

I appreciate your videos so much and I’m thankful there are guys like you who are kind enough to share all this awesome HomeKit/shortcuts/automations stuff! I’m pretty smart when it comes to tech, but man shortcuts threw me for a loop, but I’ve finally gotten the hang of it! Thanks to you, I’m hoping to have my entire home automated and HomeKit enabled (as far as the tech allows) by end of next year!! Keep up the awesome work man. Thanks again!! 🙌🏼

I enjoy watching your videos so much Shane! Thank you for all the hard work that you’re doing! Stay safe and keep these great videos coming buddy! 😊🙏

Yet another great job, Shane. A year-and-a-half after you published it, it's still useful. I'm wanting an automation that will alert me if I lock my front door when it's open. Surely someone has done this one already, but I'm having trouble getting started and not having much luck searching. Sort of like "if the front door is locked and if the door is actually open the alert me in some fashion". I have a storm door so our front door is open a lot.

Another great video! I love your shortcut examples. The shortcut scripting feature is a key to the power that is available. I’m glad you continue to give us great examples of what is possible. ES

I love this video showing the integration with Shortcuts and HomeKit. Our favorite automation is using an NFC tag to trigger our Goodnight scene. The best part about this shortcut setup is that we can also trigger the AutoSleep app to tell it we are going to bed and start tracking the apple watch, and we open dark noise to play pink noise over the Sonos speakers. Then the GoodNight scene runs in HomeKit and shuts off all the lights and TVs in the house. As always, great video Shane!

This was so well explained! This has me brainstorming all new main automation ideas!

So happy to hear someone talking about shortcuts and automatons. Both of these are so underrated by lots of smart-home channels. My favorite automatons that I’ve set up are for my smart lights. They like most HomeKit lights don’t have the feature that changes the color temperature with the time of day so I did it myself. I have it change color temperature at sunrise and sunset and I use if statements to check and make sure it doesn’t mess with any current settings (like waking me up in the morning when it’s off).

I tell everyone about how great and how fun Shortcuts can be, but they always give me the “oh, that is confusing... I wouldn’t be able to do that.” Great intro video for me to share to those that are overwhelmed by it. It really opens up another dimension of smart home / automations.

Yes!!! Can’t wait. Thanks Shane.

New subscriber - great video thank-you! I have to say as a beginner to shortcuts your real life examples are extremely helpful in showing the possibilities - please keep sharing!

Well done! This video tied up several loose threads i had in this topic. Thank you!

Such a great inspiration to make my own smart home. Greetings from Mexico 🤟🏽

lol Dude this helped so much. I figured out a bit on my own, and clicking around definitely helped me follow along but you’re the man. Out of all the HomeKit RU-vidrs you’re my go to guy.

Great video! Shortcuts are awesome. You explained this very well 👌🏽🔥

Hey Shane, good stuff bro. It would be great if you could do a video on the limitations on HomeKit such as max time a shortcut can run, etc.

Wow! Great video Shane.

Hello Shane, Thank you for your videos, It really helps me.

This guy is the best. Greetings from Portugal

Thanks for the overview, as an entry tip, I used these steps to use the single click mode on an Aqara Switch Mini to toggle a light in Homekit rather than 1 click for on, 2 clicks for off. This is trivial in the Aqara app, but as my lights are Niko Home Control based, I want to do as much as possible the Homekit interface. So I start from Homekit assign a task to the single click, convert to shortcut, insert an if statement. If the status of the light is on, turn the ligt off, else if turn the light on. That means that a single click on the Aqara Switch mini now results in toggling the status of the light, exactly what I wanted! Thanks

Great review!!!!!

Awesome man, great video!

Hi Shane you have The best videos when it comes to starting with HomeKit. It is a LITTLE overwhelming in regards to the shortcuts haha but I am sure the more I use it the easier it will get. I want to start w some automations and I like the one you have where lights come on with alarm snooze. However, when I try to add an automation I do not have the option to do personal versus home. Looks like only home comes up based on it how yours. No where do I see a personal option. Is there a reason that is not an option for me? Phone is updated, I have HomeKit enabled products. 🤷🏻‍♀️ Thanks in advance

Great video! Do you know if there is a way to re-use a shortcut I've created in a 'convert to shortcut' automation? For example, if I have 2 wireless switches that I wish would work the same? Thanks!

Well that was interesting! And useful and doable. I am starting to think about the possibilities. They are really only limited by our imagination.

You give very good information.

cool, gotta get that nightlight! PS: got it, love it!

Is it possible to start an automation with an existing shortcut? For example, start my Roborock Vaccum when I leave the house. (Roborock has pre existing shortcuts). Love your channel and what you are doing! thanks!

Hi Shane. I'm not sure if this happened with IOS 16.1 and the HomeKit update, but my friend Hugh pointed out that the "+" shown at @18:22 has been removed, and now you need to "swipe up" to get the additional steps

More of these! 🤩

Another great video, especially since I learned a few more things. It even got me to dust off the Shortcuts App and add a few new shortcuts and modify a few existing ones. Suggestion: Maybe we could send you a few of our favorite Siri Shortcuts. Then you could do a video on fan favorite shortcuts that you really liked. We could also submit suggestions for automations that have made our lives easier that others may want to take advantage of.

Hey Shane you are the GOAT when it comes to HomeKit! We have a scene when waking up and walking down the stops I say “Good morning” and kitchen lights are on at 50%. We want to convert this to a shortcut to add weather and scripts, but no trigger. We want it to start at ANY time of day when walking down the steps. Not when we press snooze, etc… Is this possible just using our voice?

@ShaneCreates What’s your best solution to pause the Aqara alarm system so I can leave for work in the morning without having to arm and disarm the system? At the moment I’m using the auto disarm feature in the Aqara app to disable during the time I typically exit the home. After that I’m running the auto arm feature coupled with the do not disturb feature at the time I’m already gone. Seems like there must be a better way, any suggestions?

Great video, Shane! I have my ‘triple tap’ set up for screenshot because anytime I try it the normal way I end up turning my phone off :)

Hi Shane! Love your videos....keep it up man! I honestly just started diving into shortcuts after getting a Hoobs device. After watching this video, I wanted to make the following automation but can't pull Apple TV remote into the automation: When I turn on ATV - workout room - Open a certain app on the ATV. It is a workout app that I can't set time of day or any other triggers outside of me turning the ATV on when I'm ready to workout. Any ideas please? thank you!

I have problems with Kasa’s existing shortcuts, so I got a HOOB to try to add it to homekit so it would be more reliable? I always get errors from the shortcuts, especially when using HomePod

Informative video as always. Have you found a way to have your phone or perhaps a bedroom HomePod mini play the new Apple Daily Briefing when you hit snooze on your alarm? I haven’t found a way to add it but just because I can’t find it doesn’t mean it’s not in there somewhere 🤪

Let's Connect Instagram - instagram.com/shanecreates Twitter - twitter.com/shanecreates Website - shanewhatley.com

Very nice instructive YT Video. Have an iPhone, IPad, & use automation in my home, just not Apple. I wish I could use HomeKit to run all my devices that SmartThings control! Someday, maybe!

Do you know if there is a way to create automations that only run on specific dates? For example, I have a "Christmas" scene that makes our dining room chandelier red and green for Christmas. A "Halloween" scene that makes it green and purple at Halloween, etc. And then I have my "Everyday" scene that just makes it normal warm light. I have an automation that turns those lights on every night, and I would love if it just automatically adjusted to the correct scene during specific days of the year - like October 1 - 31 use the "Halloween" scene, but in December use the "Christmas" scene - without having to manually change them. Does that make sense?

Hi , you have presented interesting automation about opening garage gate and flashing lights to inform you about gate opening. How to do similiar automation but with home pod mini saying : 'Gate opening ' instead of flashing lights. And for the home, not indywidual . Thanks

Great video!! There is something that I would like to but don’t know if is possible, and if it is how could be. In the blink automation that you did for example, is there anyway to change the light color in the shortcut automation?? For example, to turn on in green if something are on, and blink in red if not!

My man Shane on some next level ish.....

Love your videos! I’m new to this stuff and I’m trying to make my HomePod mini read me the weather and then play a certain playlist when I say “hey siri, good morning”. Is this a possibility?

Great video Shane. Quick question: How can someone automate a non-homekit light via a Aqara motion sensor. I have a yeelight monitor lamp which doesn't support homekit but runs well on siri shortcuts. Is there a way that I can automate it like this: "When Aqara motion sensor detects motion, run Siri Shortcut to turn on yeelight monitor lamp" ?

Hi, how do I set up home kit automation/short kit to turn a lamp off 15 minutes after the door is locked. Thank you. John

A bit late I know but can anyone help with 2 Aqara door sensors I have one at my front door and another at the top door of my stairs so I have them working to switch on my ceiling lights at night when either door is open, but they over run if I open one door the lights come on but close that door and then open the other door the timer starts again, anyway to have this ignore the second door if the first has been activated? Thanks

Hello Shane, is there a hoobs plugin for yeelight? Im having issues on the brightness

Great. Should I understand that Automations which executes Actions of type "Shorcuts" will work only if iphone is powered on?

how about if i want an app to open to a specific tab? within that app? based on location?

Ok ok ok, that Apple TV trigger was great. I’m going to have to do that for mine and see how that runs. Thanks for this. How long have you been doing shortcuts? You have a great handle on it.

Great video shane thanks. Is there a way to add an actual timer (beside the wait feature because thats not great for longer than a few seconds). I know homebridge has a dummy switch but maybe you had a tip ? Thanks

Hey Shane, how would you do that garage flash to flash regardless if light was initially on or off, but return to the state where it started? I have lutron smart dimmers and I want them all to flash if the doorbell is rung, but I also want them to return to previous state. If the lights were on, I want them on, if the lights were off, I want them off

I dont know what happened but after i updated my iphone to ios 14, the automation “play songs” which in one of them it was my alarm and in others motivation songs stopped just working and I couldn’t fix it, anyone can help.

I wonder if these types of sequences could be used to automate an 'alarm system' only using an eve door/window sensor, which then would trigger both, a nanoleaf bulb to flash red indefinitely and a HomePod mini to sound a very loud alarm, also indefinitely, until disarmed say after 10 PM from Sunday to Thursday?

Hi Shane, do you have a plan to make another videos for creating shortcut? Trying to make some shortcuts but not really straightfoward. I just want to use my motion sensor in my office only when weekdays and daytime.

How can I create an Apple Automation to notify power cuts when at home?

Could you use nfc stickers and Apple Watch trigger the automations to start ??

Timely topic... was just setting up my inside garage lights to turn on when my garage door opens. Used the “Wait” action to leave them on for a specified period of time then they shut off. What’s your experience with the maximum amount of wait time? Seems that in my case I can only do two minutes, anything past that and the lights won’t shut off. I haven’t figured out if it’s a limit of a home automation or shortcut

Hi there. Great work. Is there a away that when a Home accessorie is triggered, Apple TV opens a app?

Really hope you can help me with this. I want to create automation or short cut where I can switch on my fan heater in my summer house for 5 mins then turn it off for 15 mins then turn it back on for 5 mins then turn off , and I want this to carry on until I have done in there for the night

I'm super new to this, I find a lot of videos like this one get the the part to select the actions that are triggered when you select the shortcut and the person says "I have a scene already...etc". My question is where do you make the scene initially? That part seems to always be jumped over and is a tad confusing to a newbie. Thanks in advance if you know and can share the answer :)

That is exactly what I need, very basic level, introductory video 😊 Thank you! You did give me ideas for automation and shortcuts. Question: In automation, although I set up a podcast to play daily (because I did not know how to choose only weekdays), can I still choose from the Menu and write each individual weekday to "force" the automation to do it only on weekdays? or...

Hey amazing advice! Do you know any way you could get siri to read back to you the menu options listed in the shortcut you created? If I say “hey siri” and trigger it, it displays the options on the phone and asks “which one?” But i’d like for it to read back each option and then I can tell it which one to run.

Great video!!! I have a question that not related to this video. I’m having problem with my HomeKit setup in iOS 14.4 After I updated my phone and HomePod mini to 14.4, one of my accessories didn’t work quite right. I have a roku TV and it does support HomeKit. Also I have an automation when I turn on my TV the smart led strip installed in the back will turn on as well. That’s not the case anymore in iOS 14.4 cause after I turn off my TV for about 20 mins or so, the home app said that’s the TV is on. So when I turn on my TV again, it doesn’t trigger the automation. Idk if Apple changes something related to HomeKit in iOS 14.4. Everything works fine at 14.3

Having a couple issues with HomePod/Shortcuts/Automations... Just recently got a HomePod mini and I’m trying to create a shortcut to use first thing in the morning where i will say “good day” to my HomePod and it will turn on some specific lights and read me the forecast for the day. I set it up to turn on some hue lights, turn on some non hue lights using web hooks and ifttt and then added the weather app bit that is supposed to get daily forecast at current location. It does not do anything with the weather action. Is there a way to get it to tell me the forecast on the HomePod? Second issue. We have moved from google assistant to HomePod. On google we setup routines to just say "laundry" to google and it would start a time for 66 minutes. We had another called "towels" that would start a timer for 90 minutes. I tried to recreate these in shortcuts using the timer action but it only starts the timer on my iphone, not on the HomePod. Is there a way to achieve this?

i wanna ask a question, is there any way to make the lamp flash when there is a phone call incoming or a notification incoming (like messaging)? for example as the accessibility for deaf people where the flashlight came on. thanks

In google home routines you can make the assistant ( google mini ) talks, For example you put in the routine ( Say good morning ) then when the routine works the speaker says good morning, Is this thing availble in apple homekit speaker ???

Hi man. Could I know which security HomeKit allarm do you have? Any advice about yours or others better would be appreciated. Thank you 😊

so to use automation you need sensor for the lights etc...

My 2 cents for anyone who looks for ideas: I have a couple of shortcuts connected to NFC tags: (iphone Xr and newer). If anyone from our household puts in laundry, they can tag the tag and set a program through shortcuts when then sets reminders for the whole family. This makes it very easy for us not to forget (which happened a lot before). Second I have a personal shortcut that if any alarm goes off, through some homebridge dummy switches, my music starts playing on a bedroom homepod, my lights come on gradually. After 10 minutes, a dummy switch toggles off my lights but keeps an LED strip bright under the bed which signals me to get up. This turns off automatically after another 5 minutes. When i get out of bed, this will engage the homepod downstairs to a playlist to wake me up further. Third, and this is probably the easiest. I have a third automation that disables all alarms when i turn off my airplane mode (eg, when i wake up). Why you ask? Cuz i hate to wake up earlier than my alarm and the alarm still goes off afterwards despite you being awake already. This eliminates this. Then, another personal automation enables all my alarms again (completely invisible in the background) at midday. So, this means: If we want to sleep in, i make sure i disable all alarms myself before going to bed. no alarm, no morning routine in the bedroom and no unnecesary toggling automations on & off. If i get up for work, my morning routine runs, if i wake up a few hours later due to different appointments, i don't need to reprogram all automations just for that. In the weekends if i wake up earlier than my wife, no automations will run because i woke up before my alarm, hence all alarms disabled hence no automations and she can keep sleeping. Having this set up, this is what automations is supposed to be, set and forget and it just plain works. For me, this is such an improvement to my life and i love it! Oh and also, made some personal automations that when i charge my phone at night it goes into full airplane & DND, when i disconnect from power in the morning, everything turns back on automagically. Siri shortcuts & automations are the best!

Hello sir! I have a quick question. Is it possible to make a shortcut or scenes where it’s automatically put a timer on the music being played?

Hey Shane, I’ve been trying to get informed (call/txt,alarm) every time my entrance eve door is open. I am a newbie and I have not found any ways of doing it. Am I trying something HomeKit/shortcut can’t do? All I want is a Burglar alert when I am not home. I’ve got HomePod mini and eve door for now.

How come I cant access my Yeelight App from the shortcut script screen?

Hey Shane - I have a Smart power strip and I added it to my Homekit app on iphone & the Manufacturers app. i am able to control the strip thru both these places. Then thru Shortcut, I created an automation which says when my battery level rises above 80%, switch off the powerstrip. My battery reaches 80% on my phone, and it triggers the shortcut automation, however, I get an error - Accessory not reachable. Do you know what could be the issue?

Plz help I am trying to create an automation with the following steps:- 1. My ipad(acting as a hub) will recognise door bell sound and automation will kick off 2. If light(hue strip) is on it will set three variables huePower,hueColor and hueBrightness. 3. Than activate a scene on hue light strip and turn it red and than wait for 15 seconds. 4. NOW I WANT LIGHT TO GO BACK TO ITS ORIGINAL STATE EITHER TO OFF OR TO PARTICULAR COLOR AND BRIGHTNESS USING ABOVE SET VARIABLES.

Is it possible to choose an announcement on a homepod as an action?

Hey. New subscriber here. All new to using HomeKit and testing with IKEA Trådfri and really enjoying your videos. Do you know if you can use this Home automation to start a light in the morning and slowly bring the dimming up? Fx from 5% to 65% in first 5 min.

So I’m gradually adding smart plugs and smart switches to my home. They become kind of a mishmash of different brands. The one thing they all have in common is that you can convert the commands to Siri shortcuts. The question I have is do I have to throw out all my smart devices once a company stops supporting them? Secondly, if I buy products which are HomeKit compatible will I protect myself from this obsolescence?

Help I get the message "Action set execution partially succeeded" that is over the ok option with no other explanation?! I followed your steps exactly and deleted and re did it with no better luck. Btw I'm doing the same thing with the garage door. Any Ideas?

wow I still have not figured this all out... any suggestions to look up or make an automation that at 10pm asked to start then ask to turn off a light and turn on another, ask to set the alarm (or not) ask to turn on light In the morning (or not) when you wake up to the alarm..... I have not got any of this even watching some videos not sure if I am going out of order but the basic is just not clicking with me any for dummies ideas to get a step by step setup??? I have been searching but not getting a question and timed based automation to just turn my lights off at night as I am going to bed. enjoying your videos but I am missing the connection so how... sorry

I had it setup when every family member leaves the house it would turn alarm on automatically using shortcut. But I notice it doesn't work anymore with iOS15. Are you having same issue?

hello, can you please set this somehow? I have an automation that turns off my apple watch always on after going to the address. but after arriving at the place, only the notification of the shortcut pops up, and after clicking on it, I have to press to start the shortcut 🤷 ♂️ ... I saw that you set the notification to be turned off, but then it plays itself???

Is there a way to convert a shortcut to a HomeKit automation, I have a Dyson that works with Siri Shortcuts but doesn’t work with HomeKit

I made a personal automation so that when the morning alarm goes off, it starts my morning scene. However, the automation fails because my iPhone is locked on my charger when I wake up. The automation does trigger but asks for FaceID or access code. Anyone knows how to fix this?

Hey Shane is there a way i can trigger a shortcut from a Philips hue button 🙏🏼

When I want to repeat an automation the most frequent option appears to be once per day (Daily, Weekly or Monthly are the only choices.) So if I want to do something once per hour I have to create 24 automations. Ugly.

Can my husband and I BOTH have Home app on our individual phones and have access and controle to all the same devices?

Shane, do you know if it is possible to create a shortcut that starts multiple timers on a HomePod?

Thanx for that! Do you know if there is a way to trigger notifications in shortcuts. Like when I want to get the lamp to blink? Not bye time but with activate it like the panikbutton to arm it.. if you know what I mean

Can you help me with coding shortcuts for motion sensors? I’m trying to automate the motion sensor to turn On lights only when it’s Off, I don’t want the motion sensor change the light settings when it’s On, for example I controlled the lights in the room to be Blue while the motion sensor is programmed to turn on White light 40%, every time I change the light color or brightness with my phone the motion sensor got triggered and rest it to white 40%, so the best way to do it is to program the motion sensor is to trigger the light only if it’s Off but unfortunately I don’t know how to write the code in shortcuts Thanks

Is there anyway to make a home automation trigger a personal animation? Tony stark style? Open my closet (contact sensor) a airway speaker ready the weather and my reminders for the day

Please give me a short cut that locks the screen. Thank you

I can't get these to work, I have made a short cut to open Disney+ on my phone and it works with my Apple TV, but when I tell my gomepod to do it, it just tells me it can't open apps.

I have a HomeKit temperature sensor INSIDE my fridge and I want to trigger if the temperature rises more than 5 degrees above the freezing point. How do I do that? I don't think it's possible. EDIT: during the last few hours I found there's a way to get an Automation to invoke an SSH command on another computer. That's fabulous, and is probably how I will solve this problem, but so far I can't been able to get this feature to work at all. Do you have examples of how to use the SSH action in the Home App? I have used SSH on UNIX before but I can't seem to get it to work in the Home App. (Yes, I have Remote Logins enabled in the System Preferences.)

I have an automation that open an app when I disconnect from carplay. But it wants me to confirm before opening, so it is useless for me. Shortcuts can't open apps when connected via carplay. Another big thing that I hate with shortcuts.

Hi ! GOOOD Video ... start to geht nur ABO too... Please, can you give the Shortcut in your Videos? First for to learn and Second to use this super ideas ?!

Is it possible to make Siri say something when a sensor is triggered without using Music?

Apple Watch in Family Mode.... I have a son with autism who has one. He has not phone of his own. When he arrives and leaves, I'm able to get "Find My" notifications. On his watch, I have the "Find My"-> "My Location" field set to "This Device". The automations do not trigger. I have an automation that makes an announcement when his bus arrives, but it never fires. Bug?