How to Build a Smart Home App

We live in a world where things like house chores, security assurance, and even making coffee can be done by smart home devices. Companies like yours that deliver such products to the world make it a more convenient place and help people focus on more important things by saving time and increasing safety.

However, from the tech perspective, smart home app development may be a challenging task:

• Should you stick to BLE, Wi-Fi or another data protocol?
• How to connect several devices within one application?
• Is it possible to integrate your app with 3rd-party services like Google Home or Alexa?

So, if you’re here to build a great smart home app or simply learn more about it — read on. We’ll talk about how to speed up the development process, what Tech Stack to use, how to enable high-level security, what functionality your smart home app can have, and give you more insights on the development so you’re all set to start this challenging process.

❓ FAQs on Smart Home App Development

In this section, we’ve answered a couple of questions that you might have regarding smart home app development.

How to Make the Development of a Smart App Faster? ⚡

First, let’s talk about the firmware — a part of the software that enables the communication between smart home appliances’ physical parts (hardware). If it’s already developed and well-functioning, there will be no challenges left to handle while building the app itself.

Even though there will probably be bugs, fixing them won’t be a big deal for an experienced development company.

However, if you’re only starting to build the firmware, we’d recommend finishing it first and then proceeding with app development. Working on these two things simultaneously will make it harder to spot and fix bugs, test various versions of the app, and generally deboost the process.

One of the most convenient ways to handle such a situation is buying the device with an already built and tested firmware. This way, you save a lot of time and significantly speed up the process without losing efficiency.

Additionally, you need to update your chosen firmware to fix bugs, enable new functionality or just change something about your smart home app or appliance. To make it quick and easy, we’d recommend implementing Over-the-Air (OTA) updating.

This method allows installing updates remotely and automatically. — It's useful in many cases: if you don’t let your clients use an appliance until it’s updated and don’t make it automatic, it can cause trouble.

Let’s say you offer an app for smart pressure cookers. One of your clients decides to cook something, turns the device on, and leaves the house. Normally, people set timers, however, sometimes, one prefers turning it off manually through an app. If you release an update, that person won’t be able to use the app and is likely to at least overcook the dish if not burn it.

Such situations can significantly discredit you as a reliable provider. There are several ways how you can prevent them:

• Make updating optional and allow using older versions of the firmware.
• Offer users to schedule updating their version of the app whenever they want.
• Warn users about upcoming updates multiple times, etc.

How to Enable Data Exchange Between a Smart Hope App and a Device? 🔁

The communication between all parts of a smart home device’s ecosystem is enabled with the help of protocols — a language that machines speak.

So, to choose the right protocol for your use case, there are multiple factors that you should take into account: price, power consumption, connectivity range, bandwidth, what industry it’s most suitable for, etc.

In this table, we’ve gathered information about the most widely used protocols for smart home devices:

How to Connect Several Smart Home Devices in 1 App? 🔆

If you’d like to offer several smart home devices and want users to be able to control them through a single app, there are several options on how you can enable it.

The first thing you should take into account is that it’s only possible to use one app for several devices when they use the same protocol. So, you can build/buy devices with the same protocol, but it’s not always convenient and reasonable to do so since different protocols suit different use cases better.

Instead, many companies opt for a smart home automation hub — it’s sort of like a translator between protocols. Even if all your devices use different protocols, a hub can make them “sound” the same. And that’s option # 2.

Another way of doing so is by partnering with 3rd-party providers. There are apps on the market that are designed to unite different smart home apps. Users download apps for all their smart home devices, install a uniting app and then control them all from one place. For example, Yonomi, ONE, etc.

How to Ensure High-Level Security for a Smart Home App? 🔒

When talking about security in the smart home industry, the main problem is the lack of standards that help to control security levels, which means that it really depends on the company. To help you ensure a great and reliable security system, we’d like to give you some advice on this issue.

Before talking about security features, we’d like to cover a couple of general aspects regarding smart home apps. You can add various levels of access so that there will be less exposure to data leaking. For example, it can be an administrator with the right to manage security and access settings, extract data, etc. An administrator should then be able to add users and give each one of them a specific level of access.

Plus, it’s a great idea to educate yourself on cybersecurity and take a look at others’ experiences. Since there are no generally accepted standards as such, preventing mistakes that other companies have made in the past and learning from companies with trusted security systems is definitely worth it.

The first thing you can think of enabling is Security by Design. In other words, it’s automating such processes like bugs and breaches testing and monitoring, authentication safeguards, etc. Such a system is focused on preventing security breaches.

We’d also recommend making regular security updates. As soon as you have something to improve in the system, don’t wait until there are more things to update — regular and swift updating is the key to success here.

To make it time-efficient, you can enable Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery (CI/CD). CI allows you to automatically test the code to find & fix bugs, and then apply changes in the git-repository (you can think of it as a draft for you to test updates). The CD then transfers these changes to the actual code immediately.

Additionally, you can implement multi-factor authentication in your smart home app. It can include biometric authentication like Face ID, fingerprints (scanning all connected devices and notifying users about suspicious activities), complex passcodes that get updated, personal security questions, email/phone number confirmation, etc.

💭 Data-Related Aspects of Building a Smart Home App

When building a smart home app, data flow needs to be taken care of with extra attention. Optimizing it can significantly reduce development costs and time, boost the user experience, and improve security.

In this section, we’ll talk about all the parts of the data management process that you’ll face when developing a smart home app.

# 1: Data Collection 📥

The backend of your app is where data is collected; there are several ways of how you can set up this process, and you should remember that it will directly affect the time and costs of the development.

The first thing to pay attention to is frequency and accuracy of measurements. These two factors are interrelated — the more often you measure data, the more accurate the results are.

If you know that a certain level of accuracy is enough, there’s no reason for you to perform measurements more often than needed to reach it. So, determining the sufficient measurement frequency can help you optimize costs on data collection.

Additionally, energy consumption depends on accuracy as well. To minimize costs, you should test how much energy you’ll need to reach the needed accuracy level and set up the process in a way where data collection won’t go beyond it.

You can also think about the duration of data’s relevancy. If you know that the collected data will be irrelevant after 4 hours, you can set the maximum time gap between measurements.

# 2: Data Processing 🔄

Data processing is the next step, which also requires extra attention. If you’re going to use 3rd-party providers for data processing, make sure to take a good look at their statistics (for example, how often they’re exposed to breaches) and terms of co-working (e. g., how you can change the vendor).

For smart home devices, it’s essential to enable real-time data processing. Smart locks, coffee machines, air-conditioning, etc. — well-functioning of similar devices is based on accurate real-time data processing.

# 3: Data Storing 📚

Since internal storages of smart home devices are not that capacious, you’ll most likely need external storage or use additional internal storage. There are two ways of enabling such cloud and offline storages.

So, cloud storages are really easy to set up — you simply subscribe. Usually, it’s a monthly subscription for a certain capacity. Another option is the “pay-as-you-use” model which implies that you pay for as much storage as you use in a certain period of time.

Cloud storage is useful in multiple ways:

• You can access the data from anywhere with an internet connection.
• It’s easy to save data even if physical parts of a device are damaged.
• Maintenance is already included in the price.

However, cloud storages have a higher exposure to data leaks and breaches because of their accessibility over the Internet. Surely, there are ways to enable high-level security (we’ve already talked about that in the FAQs section), so, with great security features, you should be fine.

If you’d like to have physical data storage, you can use SD cards, FTP servers (special servers for data storing and transferring), etc. It’s safer, yet less convenient, more expensive, and uses up more energy.

# 4: Data Engineering (Analysis) 📈

Data engineering implies analyzing data at different stages of the process, extracting information that you pass to clients, and transforming it from raw data to something that a regular person would understand.

Data engineering should also work in real time along with data processing. You can perform analysis several times a day to provide users dynamics and trends (for example, humidity at their house).

Additionally, you can make conclusions and what steps to take next based on the data (for example, turning on the humidifier 3 times a day for 30 minutes to reach a sufficient humidity level).

# 5: Data Visualization 📊

To provide better user experience, you can offer visualization features to your users. That may include:

• Visualization tools (static and real-time charts, graphs, and tables).
• History to access previous visuals.
• Notifications so users find out right away if something is up.
• Alerts if there’s a matter that requires a customer’s immediate attention. Make sure that they’re distinct from regular notifications. You can allow users to set a loud sound for them, for example.

It might be reasonable to implement visual data categorization. For example, instead of making multiple graphs for various data periods in several chart types, you can simply allow users to choose how and over what period of time the data should be presented on one screen.

💻 Platforms for Smart Home Automation App Development

To help you with building a smart home app, there are platforms for the development process — a set of features and tools.

Such platforms can provide a wide range of services:

• Connecting parts of the hardware.
• Implementing protocols.
• Adding security and authentication features.
• Collecting and analyzing data with further visualization & others.

The most reliable smart home and IoT platforms on the market are AWS IoT, IBM Watson, Google Cloud IoT, Salesforce IoT, Kaa. There are really no specific use cases that can show when it is and isn’t reasonable to use a smart home platform.

You and your development team can manage all of these aspects on your own, which will take more time but be more beneficial in the long run. If you use a platform, you’ll have to pay a fee for a subscription or a use-based one, which can increase in the future.

⚙️ Features of a Smart Home App

Even though the functionality of your smart home app directly depends on the device, there are some common features that most smart home apps need.

# 1: Sign Up & Profiles 🔐

The sign up stage in smart home apps should be easy, yet secure. During this process, you can offer users to set up all the available authentication features (password, Face/Touch ID, personal security questions, etc.).

Surely, all the settings should later be changeable, but you should make access to them well-protected using any of the security features that we’ve already talked about.

Normally, to change security settings, users need to pass all the previous security layers.

Think about the ways you could help users restore their passwords in case they forget them. It can be as simple as a phone call or a multi-layered system with multiple confirmation steps.

Signing up often means connecting users’ phones to devices. You can make it automatic — so when users turn on the device for the first time, a notification with a “Connect” suggestion pops up. Alternatively, users can do it manually by following the guide on your specific device, but again, it really depends on each use case.

# 2: Home Screen 📲

The Home Screen is a place where users have quick access to all the features. We can’t really tell you what to place on this screen since functionality is highly variable depending on the type of your device.

All apps for smart home devices most likely need turn on/off and connect/disconnect buttons. Other features on this screen are mostly specific to your particular use case.

In case your smart home device doesn’t have any features but is used for measurements (for instance, temperature and humidity in the room), you should place the information your device provides here.

By the way, if you connect several devices in one app, the Home Screen should be a place where you display all the devices and allow users to access each one’s functionality.

# 3: Device Screen 🔋

The Device Screen is a part of the app where users can access all information about the appliance. Just like with the Home Screen feature, the data presented on this screen depends on each specific use case, however, there is some general information that you can place on your screen.

This screen is normally accessible from the Home Screen.

That can include:

• State of charge (if there’s a chargeable battery).
• Connectivity status and signal power.
• Functioning status.
• Telling users what’s the matter and giving clear instructions on what to do next if there are any failures.

# 4: Onboarding Guide 📃

Basically, the onboarding guide is a step-by-step instruction on how to set up the device, connect it to the app, how it works in general, what features there are, etc. The information there should be well-structured and clear.

Even though the guide should be simple, it’s still a great way to stand out. First things first, you should make sure that it fits the general style of your brand.

In addition, it might be a great idea to create a “spirit animal” for your brand that will guide customers through the setup process; it can be an actual animal like a cat or it can also be something else, for example, a customly designed robot, impersonation of your device, etc. Surely, it’s not essential but will definitely make the process funnier and more pleasant.

You can implement a chatbot feature here as well. When instructions are given, the chatbot can ask if everything is clear. If not, the bot can give a more detailed explanation, offer to take a step back to review the guide once again, or contact a real support specialist.

Generally, try to gamify the process a little so customers enjoy and value your services.

# 5: Groups & Scenarios ✅

If your app is targeted at centralized control of several devices simultaneously, you can consider implementing this feature. Group features allow users to group devices under a single command.

So, let’s say a user puts a smart lamp, air conditioning, and a speaker in a group; then, they create a “BedTime” button for this group; once they press this button, the smart home app sends different commands to the grouped devices.

For example, the lamp is turned off, the air conditioning is switched to the pre-set regime, and a sleep meditation routine is played on the speaker.

You can offer group templates for different rooms if you have enough devices for that. If not, just make it highly customizable so customers can fully tailor it to their needs.

# 6: Push Notifications 🔔

Push notifications are an important part of most smart home apps. You can use them for both alerts (like failures of systems, fires, trespassing), as well as regular situations (e.g., “food is ready”).

You should also make sounds customizable so users can mark different actions with different notifications. It’ll let them know if it’s something that requires their immediate attention or not.

🤖 How to Integrate Smart Home Devices or an App with Third-Party Services like Google Home & Amazon Alexa?

If you integrate your smart home device and/or app with similar 3rd-party providers, your customers will be able to control the device through such integrations.

To integrate with them, you simply need to get access to their APIs or SDKs that are always available on the websites:

• Alexa.
• Google Home.

However, it might be more difficult to tailor such integrations to your use case.

For voice commands to function, Google Home uses _actions _and Alexa uses skills. These commands need to be placed on a server — any server for Google Home and the AWS Lambda server for Alexa.

If you want to use custom skills and actions, you need to send them to your provider for approval. However, there are a lot of pre-written commands that you could use. So, make sure to thoroughly look through the list, maybe you’ll find all commands you need there and save time by not having to approve them.

💰 What Affects Smart Home App Development Costs

We can’t tell you exactly how much the development of your smart home app will cost since it depends on your specific use case. However, there are certainly a lot of aspects that you can think about in advance as they’ll directly affect your development costs:

1. Number & complexity of features.
2. The device itself (hardware).
3. Chosen protocol and development technology.
4. Third-party integrations or services (if you think you’ll need some of them).
5. The hourly rate of your development team .

💡 Takeaways

Smart home app development is quite a complex process and requires a lot of patience so that everything functions seamlessly. Even though it’s challenging, there shouldn’t be any difficulties with an experienced Tech Partner.

Let’s briefly summarize what we’ve covered in the article:

• To make the development cost- & time-efficient, think about having a ready-to-use software by the time you start building the app.
• When working with data, there are several aspects you need to take care of: collection, processing, storing, engineering, and visualization. Each one of them can be optimized; we’ve talked about this in the data-related section.
• To speed up the development, you can use IoT & Smart Home development platforms.
• It’s also possible to integrate the app with assistants like Google Home or Alexa.

If you need some help with the development, have any questions left, or simply want to share your thoughts with us, feel free to reach out. We’d be happy to help you!