I’ve spent years turning my house into a smart home. I have automated blinds, local-first security cameras, color-changing bulbs, motion sensors, AI integrations, and a thermostat that knows when I’m home before I even walk through the door. But every time a friend stays over for the weekend, the entire high-tech illusion falls apart. I either have to control everything for them or hand over my unlocked phone just so they can turn off the bedroom light. Who’d have thought that a hyper-personal smart home would be precisely that: a bit too personal.
My smart home works perfectly, until someone else walks in.
The reality is that Google Home and its competitors have a massive feature gap when it comes to guests. You are either a permanent member of the household with sweeping powers to delete devices, view security cameras, and change the lights in rooms to which you shouldn’t have access, or you have next to no access at all. There is no middle ground. With smart home platforms maturing, I’ve been waiting for a full-fledged guest mode to become a priority for mainstream ecosystems. But since that still remains a distant dream for big tech, I decided to take matters into my own hands and build the temporary, limited-access system that my smart home needed. It’s incredible.
