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Recommend me a smart watch I can track remotely in Home Assistant (self.homeassistant)
submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by Dave to c/homeassistant@lemmy.world
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I'm after a watch that I can put on a kid when they are on their own at a park etc.

What I'd like:

  • It's own data connection so it doesn't need a phone with it
  • Home Assistant support so I can track it remotely via home assistant, automations, etc
  • Some way of calling them when it's time to come home, or them calling us when needed
  • We don't have an iPhone so I think Apple is out since it needs an iPhone for setup
  • No subscriptions outside of the cost of the cellphone plan
  • Preferably doesn't need OEM servers, just connect to Home Assistant
  • Handling knocks and bumps would be a bonus
  • If you can run a non-google OS without tracking etc GrapheneOS style then yay but I don't know if that exists

Any suggestions?

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[-] Dave 3 points 1 day ago

I don’t think any of the T-Watches have cameras. But you’re right about the meshtastic bandwidth, it’s more for some simple messages.

Sorry I misread, it said speaker and microphone. So it can do voice calls?

Was I right about just getting two watches for communication? Is there a good crash course on understanding this stuff?

[-] SteveTech@aussie.zone 2 points 6 hours ago

So it can do voice calls?

Not over meshtastic, and not with the meshtastic firmware. The T-Watches have WiFi & Bluetooth, and are designed to be programmable. So the speaker and microphone could be used by custom firmware to do whatever, like talk over WiFi or answer calls on your phone.

Was I right about just getting two watches for communication?

If all you need is simple text based messaging then yep.

Is there a good crash course on understanding this stuff?

There's quite a few resources and videos on meshtastic. For the T-Watches themselves, AFAIK not really.

[-] Dave 2 points 4 hours ago

For the home assistant thing, how would I connect Meshtastic? I couldn't really work that part out. I assume some receiver device must exist that you plug in with a USB port in order to use the Home Assistant integration?

[-] SteveTech@aussie.zone 2 points 3 hours ago

I don't use the home assistant integration, but my understanding is you have to configure WiFi and an MQTT server on a node at your house with the meshtastic app (I probably wouldn't use a T-Watch for that, something with a longer external antenna would be better), and point it to your home assistant's MQTT server. Then there's some more configuration to make home assistant send messages and what to do when it receives messages.

Most meshtastic compatible devices do have a USB port that presents as a serial interface though, so there's probably an unofficial integration that makes use of that too.

[-] Dave 1 points 3 hours ago

Ah so it sounds like I just buy something that has an antenna and work it out from there?

The hardware doesn't look too expensive so I might just buy some and give it a go 🙂. Thanks for all your help!

this post was submitted on 07 Nov 2026
40 points (97.6% liked)

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