NFC shortcuts in HomeKit

Some of you You asked me about the new automation of iOS 13, as they are not all the flexible that we would like.. They have evolved a lot, enough to be able to put simple conditions as we commented in the entry on HomeKit’s new iOS13but they’re still a little short for advanced users. Still, and although I have a more general entry on the shortcuts app with examples and possibilities, on this occasion I wanted to tell you how the NFC shortcuts work in Homekit as they can be done

more than I had imagined I really need to.. OJO: NFC automations are only available for iPhone XS or higher, if you have an X, an 8 or earlier it is not possible to read the stickers: (

Automations with NFC

Automations via NFC are not only available for the ‘Home’ part, too. we can automate other types of actions not necessarily related to House. As you will have seen in the new shortcut app, the automations are focused there and divided into the two groups, but on this occasion we will focus only on those of House.

There are mini-NFC stickers the size of a €coin. This sticker is basically a unique serial number, so by putting an NFC reader on it is able to read that serial number and associate it to some specific action. There is no more, this type of stickers are very simple and do not need food or anything like it, the same reader (our phone) provides enough energy to activate the sticker and read the number. I bought these are available in Amazon:

As you can see, the size is very small. The idea is basically to put certain stickers of this type on strategic sites for some actions to be executed.. I tell you one example: every time I go to sleep I put the iPhone to load into a wireless load base. On this base I have an NFC sticker, so that When I put the mobile to load on this base and it’s at night (it could be for the day and then the action does not run), turn off the home lights that are turned on, change the boiler to night mode (it’s just a change in the range of activation temperatures) and activate the alarm. Without doing anything, without confirming anything, without

ask Siri for anything, simply to put his cell phone on his base on the sticker, to what cool? So let’s see how you can do this:)

https: / / youtu.be / kYAGVCM6X88 [/ embed]

Installation and configuration

In the sticker there is nothing to do as we said before, it must not be activated or changed because it has no food. What we will have to do is identify each of the stickers on the phone, and to do this we have to do the following. We must open the shortcuts application, go to the Automation section at the bottom bar and create a New Automation:

As we have said before, We can create a personal automation or an automation for Home. In this case we must create a personal automation, as in the options of the automations of House we cannot add NFC stickers as triggers, but you will see as it is possible to interact with the elements of House from the personal.

Once in this section, you have to go down to the group called Adjust and indicate NFC option to scan the corresponding sticker. Remember that each sticker has a unique number, so you better do it one at a time so we don’t mess up:

And then, we’ll just have to tell you from the Apps list that we want to use the Music app, to play a concrete playlist (although it could also be the entire Library) in a random way.

Eye, it’s important to remove the confirmation, if you won’t ask each time and you’ll have to give it to OK, it won’t be completely automatic. When we confirm, we will have the automation already created and there will be nothing more to do:

Some examples

As you can see, we have a new world of possibilities to automate jets!! Neither do you fill the house with stickers because it will be hard to remember what it’s for, each one of you, I see you coming. I tell you some things I’ve done:

NEED: Arm the alarm and turn off all the lights when you leave the house. But I can’t automate it every time my cell phone comes out because sometimes someone stays home.

SOLUTION: Sticker next to the exit door to do those actions by putting the mobile on top. I made you even a little video.

https: / / youtu.be / _ 600q6OkyW4 [/ embed]

NEED: Play Podcasts when I’m in the office. Every morning, when I get to the office, I catch up on the day’s technological news listening to some podcasts.

SOLUTION: Sticker where I leave when I get to the office and action to play podcasts in the ‘Listen’ section.

NEED: Play Music in the car in a really random way. I don’t know if it’s on the radio in my car, but every time I go in and start playing the music by connecting to the Bluetooth SIEMPRE starts with the same song. I want it to be really random.

SOLUTION: Sticker where I leave the mobile when I enter the car, and if your car also has a wireless loading area where you leave the mobile because it will be perfect! Associated with this sticker create the action of playing music at random.

This last action can be polished a little more with shortcuts, since for example you can take into account whether you have the helmets on or not… but for the moment we manage like this, we’ll talk about that in the entrance I’m preparing on shortcuts.

It is a very simple automation to perform and Save some steps like telling Siri to run some action or look for it in the Home app to make it by hand. It is obviously not for automated tasks that are to be carried out at the same time because for that we have the basic programming, but for those things that we usually do and that it is not possible to put them a specific hour. I hope you liked it and we all think of new jets to automate!