home-assistant.io/source/_components/device_tracker.ping.markdown
DubhAd 4cf0c7d1e4 Adding WiFi note (#6226)
Adding a note that modern smart phones may turn off their WiFi when idle, so this tracker may not be reliable when used by itself.
2018-09-09 09:41:17 +02:00

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page Ping (ICMP) Instructions on how to integrate Ping (ICMP)-based presence detection into Home Assistant. 2017-01-06 08:00 true false true true home-assistant.png Network 0.36

The ping device tracker platform offers presence detection by using ping to send ICMP echo requests. This can be useful when devices are running a firewall and are blocking UDP or TCP packets but responding to ICMP requests (like Android phones). This tracker doesn't need to know the MAC address since the host can be on a different subnet. This makes this an option to detect hosts on a different subnet when nmap or other solutions don't work since arp doesn't work.

Please keep in mind that modern smart phones will usually turn off WiFi when they are idle. Simple trackers like this may not be reliable on their own.

{% linkable_title Configuration %}

To use this presence detection in your installation, add the following to your configuration.yaml file:

# Example configuration.yaml entry
device_tracker:
  - platform: ping
    hosts:
      hostone: 192.168.2.10

Configuration variables:

  • hosts array (Required): List of device names and their corresponding IP address or hostname.
  • count (Optional): Number of packet used for each device (avoid false detection).

See the device tracker component page for instructions how to configure the people to be tracked.