How PorchIQ works

PorchIQ has four parts that work together: the PorchIQ server in your home, the connections it makes to your devices, the sign-in that decides who can use it, and the app you see on your screens.

Everything your screens show comes from the PorchIQ server. Your phone never talks to your devices or cloud services directly.

The PorchIQ server

The server is the heart of the system. It runs quietly in the background on a computer in your home (today, an Apple silicon Mac) and starts by itself when that computer starts. It keeps a live connection to every house, remembers history (camera events, vehicle visits, energy use, watering), sends notifications, and serves the app to your screens. If it restarts, it reconnects to every house on its own within seconds.

Connection to Home Assistant

Most devices reach PorchIQ through Home Assistant, the open-source home hub that already speaks to thousands of brands. Each house runs its own Home Assistant, and PorchIQ connects to each one with two things: its address and a long-lived access token. The connection is live, so a light switched at the wall shows on your phone within a second.

PorchIQ is a complement to Home Assistant, not a replacement. Home Assistant keeps doing the low-level work of talking to devices. PorchIQ adds the parts households care about day to day: a clear dashboard, cameras that tell you what they saw, safety confirmations, per-person access, notifications, history and plain-language automations. Anything you set up in Home Assistant (rooms, floors, device names) shows up in PorchIQ automatically.

Native integrations

Some services work better when PorchIQ talks to them directly. These native integrations use the service's own connection, with keys stored only on the server:

• UniFi consoles, for live network traffic, the internet link, and camera detections the moment they happen.
• Rachio, for weather skips, rain delays and water use on the Irrigation page.
• Twilio, to send alerts as text messages.

When a native connection isn't set up, PorchIQ falls back to the same device through Home Assistant, so the page still works with fewer details.

The built-in Matter server

PorchIQ can run its own Matter server, so Matter devices (lights, plugs, locks, blinds, sensors) work even without Home Assistant. It is off until an admin switches it on. You can pair new devices, share devices with Apple Home, Google Home or Home Assistant, and see your Wi-Fi and Thread network as a map. See Matter and the Matter server.

Sign-in and remote access

Only people the owner adds can open PorchIQ. Each person signs in with their Google account, and each device stays signed in for 30 days from its last use. Away from home, phones reach the server through a private network (Tailscale), so PorchIQ is never exposed on the open internet. On phones you can add a Face ID lock as well. See People, roles and sign-in.

Several houses

One PorchIQ server can look after several houses, each with its own Home Assistant. The house switcher at the top of every page changes which house you're looking at. Cameras, notifications and Irrigation can also show every house at once.