The apps and the kitchen frame

Each person installs the Homefellow app first, then joins the household with their own invite. An invite is a QR code or a link from an owner. It carries the household’s addresses, so the app can reach home both at home and away.

An invite’s link looks like https://homefellow.org/join#hf1.…. Opened on a phone without the app, it shows a page that says where to get the app, with a button to copy the invite. Once the app is installed, opening the link opens the app straight away. The part after the # is the invite itself. Browsers never send it to a website, so it stays on the phone.

iPhone

The iPhone app needs iOS 26.1 or later. Once it’s installed:

1. Open the invite’s link, or scan the invite’s QR code in the app, or paste the link.
2. Give your name if the invite doesn’t have it.
3. You’re in. Today opens with what needs you.

On your home network the app also finds the household by itself (“On this network”). It still needs the invite’s code to join.

Android

The Android app works on phones and tablets. It scans the invite’s QR code with Google’s code scanner where the device has Google services. Otherwise, paste the link. A tablet or a digital frame can become the kitchen frame (below).

A Mac, Windows or Linux computer

The desktop app joins with the invite link: paste it on its first screen. On a Mac or a Windows computer it can also run the household itself.

In a browser

At home, Homefellow is for the apps. The home network carries only encrypted connections. The apps check the household’s own certificate against the invite, so they connect without a warning. A browser can’t check it that way, so it warns on the home network’s encrypted address. Owners still reach the setup page and the admin in a browser (see getting started).

If you use Tailscale, the household’s Tailscale address works in any browser with no warning, at home or away.

The kitchen frame

A tablet or a digital picture frame on the kitchen wall shows the household’s day as everyone passes: the scene at the time of day, what needs you, today and tomorrow, then the week at a glance.

It’s the Android app in kitchen-screen mode. To set one up:

1. Make an invite for the frame, in the app’s Settings or on the household’s computer.
2. Install the Android app on the frame and join with that invite.
3. In the app’s Settings, turn on the kitchen screen for this device.

The frame then fills the screen in landscape, stays on and dims itself at night. Its colours follow the day, from morning light to dark paper at night.

• It shows what needs you, today, tomorrow and the week.
• You can tap to open a need, mark it Done or browse the week.
• It doesn’t ask. There are no questions, no lookups and no “Tell Homefellow something” on the frame. Questions belong on people’s own phones, where they can answer when it suits them.
• It doesn’t listen. Most frames have no microphone, so the frame has no voice.

Many digital frames run older versions of Android or have no Google services. If yours can’t scan a QR code, paste the invite link instead.

How a device reaches home

The apps try the household’s addresses all at once and use the best one that answers:

1. On Tailscale, if you use it.
2. At home, over the home network, using the server’s own certificate, which the invite lets the app check.
3. From anywhere, through Homefellow’s relay, encrypted from end to end. It goes direct whenever your networks allow and through the relay when they don’t.

Settings in each app shows which way it’s reaching home (“How this phone reaches the household”). See reaching it from your devices for the details.