Activity detected in the home, but there isn't any

[MattMoo44]

For the past 4 days my home constantly switches to Home mode when there is no activity at all. Checking the activity log shows 'activity detected in the home'.

Even if I turn off mobile location and all of the devices so that nothing is contributing to the Home/Away status.... Set it to Away. After about 20 minutes, it switches back to Home mode. The same thing appears in activity history 'activity detected in the home'.

This is causing the heating to run constantly when there in no one home.

Support told me to buy a new one. But it's clearly a software problem. Even when I turn Home/Away assist off, the mode changes to Home on it's own. 

[Willowsauntie]

We are having the same problem and no help forthcoming 

[Alexandra16671]

Yes same here. I w got three doing the sane??? 

[Biffo]

Me too! This started on Tuesday. The Nest3 is on the south coast of England. My firmware version is 5.9.5 and the device has not been migrated to Google. Using the app remotely I switch it to AWAY and after about 20 minutes it has reverted to HOME. The activity log says motion was detected in the home.

[MattMoo44]

Just had another try at getting some support. The agent told me to buy a new device and abruptly ended the chat. Never experienced such poor service. Now Nest is owned by Google, I can't see me buying any further products. 

[Speigal]

I'm having the same issue for 2-3 days. Turning off home assist and setting Nest and alarms to non-active for movement makes no difference it is displaying activity detected! A bug?

Any help appreciated as this is expensive while away!

[Speigal]

I have examined the log all activity detected is at 28 mins or 58 mins past the hour. Suggests a bug. Please note I have disabled the Nest and Protect devices from detecting activity so this can only be a fault. 

[thegios]

same here.

[Speigal]

Hi I have been in touch with Google Nest via Instant Messenger.  This seems a useful way to interact. They have asked me to switch off home assist, deactivate all devices which detect activity, remove additional phones, check my phone location is being detected, stop auto scheduling and remove the current heating schedule. So far so good but monitoring the situation. I am currently away so I have set to Eco temps while away. I will report back in a day or two. 

[Alexandra16671]

Can I just clarify…you’ve done all that and now your thermostat is working exactly as it did before? 

[thegios]

I have a Nest Thermostat 3rd gen and a Next Camera.

In Google Home app I have a routine to turn camera on and thermostat off when away (and the other way around when st home).

Usually all is working fine but today a few minutes after I left home and away routine ran, even if both phones where detected as away, the next app marked both phone as at home and therefore the at home routine ran and thermostat was turned on, keeping camera on. I switched manually to away on Google home app but a few minutes later next app marked both phones as at home and again at home routine ran and thermostat was turned on. The whole day.

[Alexandra1667]

please see other piss about this functionality. Thermostats are switching to home when no one at home even if you don’t use phone location. If you them manually set yo away it switches back again. Mine are third gen thermostats and all three doing this in separate properties 

[thegios]

Is it solved for you?

[thegios]

Yes I read and commented, same problem here since yesterday

[Fil0083]

It seems this issue has been affecting several users since last week. There's another open thread discussing it here:

Re: Activity detected in the home, but there isn't... - Google Nest Community

[kalanbays]

I have been using Six Google Nest Gen 3 thermostats for the last few years,  five are at one large business location on one account, and 1 is at my residence at another location on a separate account. 

In the last few days, I have noticed neighter my home or the business location have been transitioning to AWAY, when no one is at either place, I use only the moting sensors in the thermostats, which have been working well since install until recently.  Also, when I use the GOOGLE HOME App to manually switch to AWAY, a few minutes later the thermostats go back to HOME, despite there being no one there.  The activity log is showing it changes to home from touch (there is no one there and no animals).  I have cameras that show the location of the thermostats and they have not been touched an no one walks by.  When they are set to Away, when I walk by them they do not change to home like they have in the past.  I have removed the particular thermostat from the action item, then the trigger just picks another thermostat to attribute the action to in the activity log.

I have restarted each thermostat, check the Automations setting for home and away and all things are set up correctly.  I was wondering, since this is happening at two locations on two different account, is there a system wide issue going on, I am unable to get it to work the way it did.  Thanks in advance.

[gerrymcdougall]

Same thing is happening to mine. Interested to see if anyone else  has the problem as it sounds like it could be more than just my unit

[Fil0083]

It seems this issue has been affecting several users since last week. There's another open thread discussing it here:
Re: Activity detected in the home, but there isn't... - Google Nest Community

[kalanbays]

Thank you, I will continue to follow this thread.

[kalanbays]

I think this may be fixed now as my thermostats appear.to be working correctly now.

[JJD101]

Hi there

I'm having an issue where my Nest activates heating when no-one is home

I live alone and only one phone used for location (Pixel 7 Pro)

Occasionally when coming home from work the house is already warm. Looking at the activity history the following day the heating was activated by the schedule. I'm pretty certain that all location settings are correct. 

This has been happening intermittently for quite a while - I sometimes thought it could have been triggered as I drove past the end of the road (around 200m), but, last weekend I was away - around 350 miles away. The heating still came on even though my phone was with me, and no-one in the house to trigger the motion sensor

Any ideas anyone?

Cheers

[furqanhamid]

I have faced a similar issue with my Nest where the heating would activate unexpectedly, even when I was away. In my case, it turned out to be a glitch in the schedule settings and not the location tracking. You need to check your schedule settings and make sure that Home/Away Assist is properly configured. Otherwise, a quick reset and re-calibration might help too.

[JJD101]

Cheers. I'll give it a go and see what happens. Could be a while before reporting back (as it needs time to see if worked) 

[Speigal]

See the thread: Activity detected in the home but there isn't any

Several fixes are discussed but the consensus is this is a bug in the app or Google cloud rather than a local issue with your NEST.  Read the thread otherwise contact Google support. I found contacting them via Messenger worked well. 

[Speigal]

Sorry to report that after a day or so the Nest reverted to home after reporting activity despite this being turned off. I am currently away. What is interesting is that occurs at 28 or 58 mins past the hour suggesting a bug. If does appear to be a Google server problem as so many reports in the last week or so. I will try to reset the Nest to factory settings but I don't think the problem is at my end. I noticed it more likely to revert to home when I interacted with the app, less likely when I did not check up on the Nest status. 

[Speigal]

Update. Nest appears to be showing no false activity reports for 2-3 days and stayed "away" as required.  I"m still away so incrementally turning back on activity detection for 3 alarms and the next.  Have other people noticed any improvement or is it just me? Home next week so I will reset the Nest but do think this is a bug with the Nest online support or app. 

[thegios]

Wil test tomorrow I'll be out whole day

[kalanbays]

My one qt my residence and five at the business appear to be working properly again.

[gerrymcdougall]

Recently I have noticed that when I set the nest to Away on the app it changes back to Home about 10 later. There is nobody in the property at the time. I have tried completely resetting the thermostat but it has not cured the problem. Could it be the motion sensor that is faulty?

[jrawle]

I know you've already seen the other threads, but for anyone else viewing the forum (as it isn't easy to find anything) here is a link to a longer thread where this is discussed:

https://www.googlenestcommunity.com/t5/Nest-Thermostats/Activity-detected-in-the-home-but-there-isn-...

[DiscardedNester]

I've been using the same Nest 2nd Gen, iPhone app, and HAVC system for years.  Eco used to work properly - I'd leave home, ad Next would go into Eco.  A few weeks ago that stopped happening, it just stays in normal temperature mode until I manually set it to Eco via the app.

• I have Reset the Nest, and verified it's running the latest version
• I have force restarted the app, and am running the latest version
• Both the app and Nets are set for Home/Away Assist
• I am a single person, with a single app running on my phone for location
• The app shows every time it's (properly) detected me Home or Away ... but Eco doesn't kick in
• The Nest is consistently accessible when any from home via the app, and the app shows heat/cool usage and the manual Eco mode changes

[DiscardedNester]

From Nest/Google Support...

"We're aware of the issue with Home and Away - the team is actively investigating. We'll keep you posted as we learn more and when you can expect a fix. Thank you for your patience."

[Fil0083]

I have been experiencing the same issue since January 16, 2025 (I never had this problem before). I have a Nest thermostat Model Display-2.14 with Software version 5.9.4-5.

Here’s what I’ve tried so far:

Factory reset of the Nest thermostat over the weekend.
Reinstalled the Nest and Google Home apps multiple times.
Experimented with various settings combinations, including deactivating the thermostat sensor for detecting whether someone is at home, both in the Nest app and Google Home app.
Contacted Google support for further assistance.
Despite these efforts, the problem persists. Whenever I set my status to "away," the status changes back to "home" within 10 minutes due to detected activity, according to the logs. This happens even when all automatic sensor and detection options are deactivated.

It's somewhat reassuring to see that others are experiencing similar issues. Otherwise, I would suspect the sensor in my Nest thermostat might be faulty.

[Alexandra16671]

Please contact Google and report this issue. Ask that it be sent up to senior tech support otherwise they won’t know there is a problem. This is a network issue not a thermostat issue unless it’s to do with some update 

[Fil0083]

I reported this issue to Google, and it has been escalated to senior tech support. I’ve just received their response: their proposed resolution is to purchase a new device, as my thermostat is out of warranty.

[Alexandra16671]

Please do not accept this. I have three thermostats in separate properties all doing this sane fault. If they tell me to buy new thermostats I will be furious. 
point out that there are other people with the sand issue. This is not a broken thermostat issue it’s something more complex with server issues or network updates 

[Fil0083]

I agree that this doesn’t seem like an isolated issue. I’ll look into how this can be escalated further and explore other options. Perhaps opening a new chat with Google support might help to raise additional awareness.

Out of curiosity, what steps have you taken so far to address this with Google? It might be helpful if we can pool our experiences to present a stronger case. Let’s see if we can push for a more satisfactory resolution together.

[thegios]

O got an email from tech support asking a list of useless questions. Thing is that Google support must realize the problem is global and treat all of us in the same way, recognizing it's a problem on their server. If they keep on dealing one by one for each of us, nothing will ever happen. 

[Fil0083]

To be fair, after manually setting the 'Away' status from both the Nest and Google Home apps, and deactivating the Nest thermostat presence sensor multiple times in both apps, it now seems to be holding the 'Away' status since 13:18 this afternoon!

[thegios]

Still not a solution: I want my products to work as expected