RoomSense IQ Aims to Add Occupancy, Activity Detection to Your Home Assistant Setup

RoomSense Labs is aiming to make it easier to include person and activity detection in your home automation setup, using a monitoring device that combines millimeter-wave (mmWave) radar and passive infrared (PIR) sensing: the RoomSense IQ.

"RoomSense IQ is an advanced open-source hardware room monitoring device that utilizes cutting-edge mmWave radar technology and [a] PIR sensor to detect and measure people's movement, providing highly accurate occupancy detection," the company explains of its creation. "With its ability to measure temperature, humidity, light density, and by adjusting the detailed configurations in Home Assistant, you can customize the device to your liking, creating a personalized occupancy detection method that perfectly fits your living space."

The RoomSense IQ itself is a compact sensor board built around an Espressif ESP32-S3-WROOM-1 module. To this, the company has added multiple sensors — with the stand-out being the mmWave radar, capable of scanning a room and detecting not only the presence of people but their activity levels too. The more traditional PIR sensor is used, the company claims, to filter out false-positives, such as the movement of fans, while temperature, humidity, and light sensors are also included.

A major part of the RoomSense sales pitch is its compatibility with Home Assistant. The company has released a dashboard design which pulls in real-time data from the sensor, plotting its readings at 25ms intervals, using the Mosquitto MQTT broker and MariaDB running on a Raspberry Pi 4. The source code for the dashboard is included, allowing users to customize it to their requirements.

While RoomSense has released the dashboard source, though, it has not yet released any technical details of the sensor itself — and nor has it confirmed pricing and availability, with interested parties asked to sign up on the website to be notified when hardware becomes available.