Honest assessment of where the Rachio 3 is going

Can users get an honest roadmap and assessment from @franz or @dane or someone at this company as to where this product is going?

We’ve been mislead and guided down a dead end road with the whole “This unit is Home-kit compatible” mess. 2+ years and this company is no closer now (and multiple new employees working on the issue) than we were 2 years ago. They even still advertise that it is compatible…

As far as the product, users have mentioned numerous issues and improvements they would like to see. One major one, is how the algorithms calculate run sprinklers with “end before sunrise.” This would be an ideal setting to use, however the algorithms are messed up on it and it runs them at odd times in the middle of the night so water sits on the grass all night causing disease.

As far as the IOS app, seems nothing has been updated on the app since your failed Thrive project. That was the last major update to your app, and since that project was a failure, nothing new has come to the app. No new features, no new firmware. There was talk a year ago about making the setup process easier for people to use, especially with setting schedules. Nothing.

So please, be honest with your community who paid good money for your product. Are you continuing to improve this product, or is it just dead in the water?

Thanks.

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The last update has made HomeKit with the Rachio totally useless for me.


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If I open and close it a bunch of times sometimes it will show up properly and work but then it goes back to a blank screen.

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I’ve been impacted by the bug where when you pause a zone it doesn’t count anything before the pause in the water total. This makes the moisture percentage wrong. I reported it TWO years ago and nothing. Every 4-6 months I call and they tell me it’s “with engineering”. It really takes the shine off a rather otherwise decent product. Not to mention no firmware in two years which means no fixes for some very major WiFi security issues/bugs.

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The silence by the people at this company, like @franz who is active on this forum, speaks volumes, and is like spitting in the face of paying customers. Not even a simple response from any of them. Will not recommend this product to any of my new neighbors (have about 15 new construction houses in my neighborhood).

What a shame.

Hey @KidCapri Sorry I missed this. I’m the primary contact on this forum and it’s on me for not following up here. Our new firmware engineer will get started on the HomeKit project shortly and we will post more details in the coming weeks. I am excited to have them on the team and I am fully confident in their abilities.

I’ll also address your other points in your first post. First, we know that the “End by” setting on Flex Daily can be a pain point specifically for users with a lot of zones and a long total schedule duration. We have thoroughly reviewed this request and unfortunately do not have any solutions that we can implement in the near term, but will continue to look at ways we can improve our core schedule experience.

I’m sorry that you feel like we haven’t made any significant updates to the app. I’d like to note the work our team has done to release several feature enhancing updates to our software over the past six month, most notable:

  • Weather Intelligence service:
    • Updated historical data from 30 year averages to 10 year averages to account for climate change
    • Enhanced detail (more accurate) aggregate weather data for our Weather Intelligence Plus Network
    • Evapotranspiration data is now available to international users outside of the US
  • Past/Upcoming runs on the homescreen
    • Enhancing schedule visibility so users do not have to click through the app to see their schedule history and upcoming schedules
  • WiFi Troubleshooting Flow
    • Released updates to the in-app WiFi troubleshooting flow allowing users to automatically submit a support ticket so our support team can help resolve WiFi connectivity issues

It’s worth mentioning that we just released our Dynamic Crop Coefficient update With this update we are changing from a static CC that is a yearly average of a crop’s monthly CC to a dynamic CC that represents the crop’s CC that changes month to month based on agronomy data.

We have also documented the other item mentioned in this thread, which is schedule pause and usage data. This has been prioritized but work has not started on it yet.

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Its not the first one you have missed, you have been tagged on the dreaded HomeKit thread several times and not responded. Also, the regular Friday updates have not been consistent.

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Not sure where the rest of the community is here, but this kind of tone is really unnecessary and unwarranted. This is lawn irrigation. Maybe there are other things going on, maybe your cocco pebbles got soggy. Not sure. But Rachio is about is as good as it gets and has been for some time. Company’s take chances on new products and they don’t always work out. Some do and some do not. Its not easy. Either way, the crew at Rachio deserves your respect and grace. If you are feeling like Rachio is not for you, make a change. But if you are in this game, find a way to keep it positive and constructive. Stay classy San Diego.

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Hey @dane
Wondering why you locked THIS THREAD after someone posted an honest post to you? Enough hiding and BS bro, come clean on whats going on with the homekit, ok? Users are tired of having another watering season with a broken controller!

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This is the silliest comment I have read here. You are probably an employee sticking up for Rachio after years of this defect, or you must enjoy paying money for products that don’t function as described.

He locked it just as he did with the first update thread, so it can be used as an update thread, and not turn into a 1600 post monster like the other thread.

Sorry but as a Product Manager that’s not how it works.
Not when customers pay money and get a product that does not work with a core feature and seems buggy.

They don’t deserve anything, especially when issues with HK have been going on for years.