Controller for HomeKit is another way to control and set up HomeKit accessories, scenes, and automations from your iPhone. The app has been around for a while, but it got a major upgrade this month with new features that turn the app into a fun and powerful home control center.
Now, Controller for HomeKit can leverage the iPhone's LiDAR sensor to scan your entire home and create a 3D floor plan on top of which you can then overlay lights, scenes, and other HomeKit accessories. The result is a fun, customizable, interactive UI that's so easy to use and intuitive it feels right at home in Apple's Home app for iPhone.
Let's check it out.
The first thing to note about the Controller for HomeKit is that the app's entire interface has been revamped. The main screen now has a much simpler layout, and from there you can easily navigate to a list of HomeKit categories filtered by room or type. You can also access more advanced sections of the app from here, where you can create workflows, build scenes, and set up automations for custom NFC tags. A home full of smart devices can quickly get unmanageable, so the simplicity of the Controller's main screen is a welcome change in this app category, and one I'm all for.
Of the app's more advanced sections, my favorite is probably “Maintenance.” This is where it lists all of the potential issues with your setup, like devices with low batteries, devices with duplicate names, devices that are currently inaccessible, etc. This section might finally give me the motivation I need to fix all of my HomeKit issues over the next few weeks.
But the highlight of this update is Controller's new “Floor Plan” feature. Right from the app's main screen, you can begin the process of scanning your home using your iPhone's camera and LiDAR sensor. It can take some time depending on the size of your home, but it's super easy and intuitive. All I had to do was follow the app's instructions and hold my phone in front of me while walking around each room in my apartment.
Honestly, it was a lot of fun. The quality of the scan highlights just how powerful the iPhone's LiDAR sensor and AR capabilities are. All of the major furniture pieces appeared exactly where they should be, and certain furniture types (sofas, chairs, beds, kitchen appliances, tables) even had their own 3D models.
Once the scan is complete, the app will take you to an editing screen, where you can drop HomeKit accessories and scenes directly on top of your floor plan. This is where your floor plan becomes interactive: you can place room labels that you can tap to instantly jump to a view of that room, place lights that you can turn on and off, and even view sensor readings on a map.
This process may take some time depending on how many accessories you add, but the results of this entire process will be very satisfying. On iPad and Mac, the experience is even better: the app takes full advantage of the widescreen layout of the devices.
In addition to being able to view floor plans from within the app, the Controller for HomeKit comes with two new widgets that display floor plans on the home screen. Unfortunately, these widgets essentially act as simple buttons to open the app. Accessories and room labels don't appear in the widgets, and you can't interact with them unless you open the app. This means that the Controller's home screen widgets are just decoration for now, which is a shame. There is huge potential here for fully interactive widgets, and I sincerely hope that they will be realized.
Still, Controller's interactive floor plans have become a must-have on my iPhone. While its very nature is by no means revolutionary, the UI paradigm it creates for controlling HomeKit devices is one of the most intuitive I've ever seen on iOS. To turn on a specific light in your apartment, I think it's hard to come up with a more natural interaction than looking at the room on a map and tapping on the light in its exact location in the room's physical space. If Apple decides to go this route, it could be the best upgrade to the native Home app's UI in years. As a result, I've officially added interactive floor plans to my iOS 18 wishlist.
If you'd like to give it a try, Controller for HomeKit is available for free on the App Store for iOS, iPadOS, macOS, and watchOS, and the Floor Plan feature can be unlocked with a $29.99 annual subscription or a $99.99 permanent purchase.