HomeKit remote access not always working

I’ve legitimately tried every solution under the sun with no luck. Logging out and back into iCloud doesn’t work for me. And yeah, with so many devices connected, that’s not a workable solution every time you want to have remote access to devices. I’ve tried this about four thousand times at this point with luck. I wish Alexa had functionality through Siri, if she did, I would be using Alexa right now. I’m over Apple not supporting their products properly.

Same here. My Apple TV 4K is also direct connected via Ethernet and has not once had an issue, until the day the HomePod cane out. It started showing as Apple TV Not Respondinf in the Home app. Ever since then it and my HomePod are showing as Disconnected in the Home app hub section and I have not had remote functionality for 6 weeks now with no help from Apple explaining why or providing a solution. There are other people with the same issue that I’ve been talking to on sites like Reddit. I’m tired of waiting and my patience is wearing thin. I’ve invested a lot in HomeKit and this is disappointing, to say the least.

I never got away from home working. My home hub says it is connected when I’m not home too. It only says not responding for all my devices. I have 2 schlage sense locks, chamberlain garage hub, several leviton light switches (these are junk, I had 1 dead on arrival. And 2 failed working a week) and they only work when my iPhone is connected at home via wifi. I tried all the instructions and resets, updates. Followed so many threads and My Apple TV 4 gen is wired to my network. Im an IT professional and I find this ridiculous. I’m going to switch to google home or Alexa. I give up on Apple.

Yeah apple got back to me earlier this week and basically told me to wait for a future software update, but would not say for sure if it would be the next one or even the next ones after that. They wouldn’t even put that in writing, which is what makes it even more infuriating. I’m going to pester them every single day and begin to share with social media, tech sites and even news agencies. This is ridiculous for them to treat their customers like this. I’ve lost faith in Apple completely and will no longer recommend them to family and friends.

I am having similar issues.

On my iPhone on the home app the Apple TV hub shows connected however on the wife’s iPhone the same Apple TV hub shows standby.

Both phones are updated and the Apple TV is also updated.

I can interact with any device when at home and away from home but the wife’s phone can only interact when on the home Wi-fi. The home app on her phone shows not responding when away from home yet the devices are still accessible through their own apps.

Have Apple came up with a solution yet.

Well, It's been months, and my remote access is still hit or miss. Some devices are fine, others are not communication. When I'm on my home network, everything seems ok.

The same issues, with the same procedures to try to fix it, sometimes it works, other times not. Log out of everything, update all devices, iphone, appleTV, etc. sign back in, multiple times until you get lucky. I've been relying on the stand alone apps from the manufacture to check on devices remotely. I really wanted one place to do everything, the HOME app, but that doesn't seem to be working reliable at this time.

I’m beyond frustrated. I want Apple to reimburse me on all the time and money I’ve spent on HomeKit enabled devices, and the time I’ve now spent trying to make it work after it broke. I have all these expensive smart devices that have zero functionality. So disgusted.

THANK YOU SO MUCH. So I followed your directions and turned off the 5ghz bands on my Unifi home network setup. It seemed to work, but only for my Lutron lights on the Home app. Very interesting because before my Apple TV 4 said “connected” when you click the location icon but the devices all said no response. My August smart locks and 1/3 of my ecobee thermostats still say no response, which I’m trying to figure out. I tried forcing my August smart doorbells to a 2.4 band network as well because the doorbells serve as a bridge for the locks, but didn’t have any luck. Thank you for the tip on the WiFi bands!

I had similar issues. some days ago I got a new router, internet connection works fine, but after some time when I haven’t use my iPad (hub) the internet dropped out. So I reinstalled the old router and everything works as before.

Same problem here, kudos to the one who persisted with tech support to discover an iCloud block. If an iCloud block is responsible then I want to know what this means. Anybody know What an iCloud block is? How does it get initiated? Who’s responsible for these blocks? Who has the rights to unblock? Is it Only Apple tech support who can unblock? Please chime in, this is important. I’m tired of “No Response” on HomeKit.

The way Mason explained it to me, was that if you send 2-4 (can’t remember the exact number) of the same text message to someone one right after another, your Apple ID gets marked as a spam account (or something to that effect) and the block happens automatically. Only Apple has the ability to unblock it. Hope this helps.

I called Apple, and they said there are no blocks on my iCloud account. Still the "No Response" when away from home persists. Apple recommended I reinstall my apps, or reset my iPhone - quite a lot of trouble. No guarantee that even that will work. Anyway, thanks for the post. All we can do is try.

I think it’s a WiFi connection issue with the Xs and Xs Max. Never had these issues with my X. iPhone Xs Max had WiFi connection issues last night and it used a ton of cellular data last night. Not happy

Hi ottoharsh,

I’m not sure if you have the right thread with your comments about WiFi issues... unless I’ve missed something here.

Either way... if you’re not already aware, you can reduce the usage of cellular data usage when connected to WiFi by switching off ‘WiFi assist’ - you’ll find this in settings->mobile data, then scroll all the way to the bottom. This will also show you how much data has been used by this service since the last reset of data counters. I hope this helps you reduce mobile data usage, although you may already be aware of it. Basically, the service is intended to speed up data access when WiFi connectivity is poor or slow.

I cannot comment on the merits/drawbacks of either the X or Xs, as I’m still on the 7. But the WiFi assist service exists across all current models. However, it’s perfectly possible that the actual connectivity is poor on the specific hardware, for some other reason.

This is my situation: on LTE, even if the signal is good, often the accessories are not reachable and I have to make more attempts to connect closing and opening the app Home. On WiFi (mine or other) all the devices are connected and respond without problems.

My hub is an iPad.