HomeWatch vs pfAdmin
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
HomeWatch
Monitor and control your HomeKit devices with a glanceable status display. This app offers customizable views for rooms, scenes, and individual devices across Apple platforms, including widgets and menu bar items.
- Glanceable room status with color-coded indicators
- Control scenes and devices within rooms
- View camera feeds, weather, and website content
- Customizable home and lock-screen widgets
- Menu bar items for Mac with real-time updates
- Extensive interface customization options
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I made an app for my Apple Watch to see a glanceable status of our home and to control our HomeKit devices. It worked so well on the watch, that I expanded it to a dashboard app for all our Apple devices. I have now added a configuration interface to make it compatible with any HomeKit enabled home setup. I hope some of you will find it useful. HOME VIEW The circle / grid with icons on the home view shows a color coded status of the rooms of the home: red when a door is open, yellow when a window is open, orange when the heating is on, cyan when lights are on and green when nothing is on. On the iPhone, iPad, tvOS and Mac the app also shows the time, date, cameras, feeds, events, reminders, a website and weather information. When there is rain, it will show a rain graph. ROOM VIEWS When a room is selected, the circle layout will show the scenes you can control in that room. The grid layout also shows the devices that can be controlled in that room. Additionally the room view has an information section. To the right it can show any characteristics from your devices. Below is a detail view that can show a camera view, a website, a temperature, humidity and climate history graphs. WIDGETS Fully customisable lock-screen and home-screen widgets. Tap / Clicking a widget item to go directly to a room view, execute a scene or launch any url-scheme. Customisable complications on the Watch can have actions to go directly to a room view and execute any scene. MENU BAR ITEMS On the Mac any HomeKit characteristic can be added to the menu bar and is kept up to date. CUSTOMISATION The interface can be fully customised. The user can add their own background images and icons from the photo library. Customise gradient overlays, icons, fonts, colours and more. Make it your own…
pfAdmin
Manage your pfSense firewall remotely from your iPhone or iPad. This client connects securely via SSH, requiring no installation on the firewall or cloud services. Monitor and control your network security on the go.
- Remote pfSense management
- Secure SSH connection
- No firewall installation required
- No cloud service dependency
- Monitor firewall status
- Manage firewall settings
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pfAdmin puts your pfSense firewall in your pocket. Monitor and manage a stock pfSense box from your iPhone or iPad over a secure SSH connection - nothing is installed on the firewall, and nothing goes through a cloud service. Requires a pfSense firewall with SSH enabled. pfAdmin is an independent client and is not affiliated with or endorsed by Netgate or pfSense.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: HomeWatch at Free against pfAdmin's $3.99. HomeWatch also leads on device support (6 vs 2) and iOS requirement (15.6 vs 17.0). pfAdmin's advantage is review sentiment (100% vs 60%) and rating (5.0 vs 4.8). On ratings volume, update cadence, ads and in-app purchases there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
HomeWatch is free to download; pfAdmin costs $3.99 up front. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
pfAdmin holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.8. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 4 and 2 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 60% of HomeWatch's written reviews are positive against 100% of pfAdmin's.
HomeWatch ships an update every 2 months, pfAdmin monthly. The most recent releases landed on October 4, 2026 and October 19, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | HomeWatch | pfAdmin |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free — better | $3.99 |
| Rating | 4.8 (4 ratings) | 5.0 (2 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 60.0% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 4 — better | 2 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months | Monthly — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free — better | Paid |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod, Mac, Apple TV, Apple Watch — better | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 15.6 — better | 17.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 64 MB | 14 MB |
| Age rating | 17+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Peter Vogels | D4VINDER LTD |
Customer experience
HomeWatch
pfAdmin
In-app purchases
HomeWatch
No in-app purchases
pfAdmin
No in-app purchases
