See what your presence sensor covers before you buy
Draw your room with furniture and doors, place a sensor and see where it detects presence. In the browser, on your phone too, no sign-up.
Where is the best spot for the presence sensor, is one enough for the living room, and does it see through the open door into the hallway? Until now you had to try it out. With the room planner you draw your room in the browser, add furniture and doors, and let it suggest presence sensors or place them yourself. The plan shows straight away the range and detection area of each sensor.
In short: what the room planner does
- Room as a rectangle, L-shape or custom shape, with dimensions in metres and ceiling height. You drag the walls directly in the plan.
- Furniture from templates: sofa, armchair, chair, dining table, bed, desk, kitchen unit, cupboard, chest of drawers, TV wall, TV, shower, toilet and bathtub. Cupboards, metal and masonry block what lies behind them; sofa, bed and table are places where people sit, they do not block.
- Doors, openings, windows and columns on the wall, doors open or closed, a curtain in front of the window.
- Presence sensors on a wall, in a corner or on the ceiling, all four models: Basis, KL and KL LD and KL MZ.
- The plan shows the detection area: in strong colour where the presence sensor detects presence, so also someone sitting or lying still. Light colour shows where it only sees motion, white what it does not cover.
- “Suggest sensors” places as many presence sensors as it takes until every seat and bed and as much of the room as possible lie in the presence area, with a room climate sensor and on the ceiling if you like.
- Tell zones of the room apart, such as sofa and dining table: draw the zones and the planner finds the multi-zone presence sensor for them.
- Notes with a fix: what reaches out through open doors, where two sensors can interfere with each other, where the sensor fits better.
- The plan lives in the link: share it, carry on on your phone, no sign-up, no cookies. The presence sensors you chose go from the summary into the cart.
How to plan presence sensors for your room
- Create the room. Under “Room” you choose Rectangle, L-shape or Custom and enter the inside dimensions and the ceiling height. You drag walls and corners directly in the plan; with the custom shape, the plus in the middle of a wall adds a corner. Under “Doors, windows, columns” you add openings and slide them along the wall to the right spot.
- Add furniture. Under “+ Furniture” you pick a template, move the piece in the plan and adjust width and depth. What matters most are the places where someone sits or lies still: sofa, armchair, bed, dining table, desk.
- Choose the task. Under “+ Sensor” the planner asks: “What would you like to do?” The choices are “Detect presence and motion in the room”, “Tell zones of the room apart” and “Choose the sensor myself”.
- Let it suggest sensors or place them yourself. “Suggest sensors” places the sensors for you. The tick box “Place at least one sensor with a room climate sensor” is preselected; tick “Also suggest ceiling mounting” if there is power on the ceiling. To place a sensor yourself, tap a model or drag it into the plan, on a phone after a short press. On a wall or in a corner it counts as wall mounting, in the middle of the room as ceiling.
If there are already presence sensors in the plan, the planner asks before suggesting whether it should replace them. “Undo” brings them back at any time, and with “Place another sensor yourself” you add to the suggestion.
Reading range and detection area in the plan
A radar presence sensor detects motion further away than a person at rest. That is why every sensor has two areas in the plan: the strong one shows presence, where it also detects someone sitting still on the sofa or lying in bed. The light one shows the edge where it only sees motion. Seats belong in the strong area, otherwise the light goes off while you read. The range depends on the model: Basis and KL cover 6 m at 120 degrees, the KL LD 9 m at 150 degrees, presence about one metre less in each case. The KL MZ detects presence up to 4 m and motion up to 6 m. Why radar also detects people at rest and a motion detector does not is explained in Presence sensor or motion detector?
On the ceiling the presence sensor covers a circle. The planner calculates it at 1.5 m above the floor, where people sit, not on the floor. From the ceiling the sensor sees over cupboards.
Doors and windows change the picture. Through an open door the sensor sees outside, and anyone walking past in the hallway triggers it. Through a closed door only motion gets through; it does not detect presence behind it. It does not see through window glass, but a curtain moving in front of it does trigger it. Cupboards, metal and masonry block what lies behind them.
For every point you should check there is a note with a fix: limit the range in the sensor's app, move the sensor to the dashed spot, add a second sensor or, with the KL MZ, mask out the area at the door in the app. Tapping it shows in the plan what is meant. “Find the best spot” checks whether your sensor covers more seats somewhere else and otherwise names a different model or a second sensor, each with the extra cost.
Tell zones of the room apart
If the light at the dining table is to switch independently of the sofa, each place needs its own zone. Only the multi-zone presence sensor KL MZ tells zones apart; Basis, KL and KL LD detect whether someone is in the room, but not where. Under “+ Sensor” choose the task “Tell zones of the room apart”. Then draw the zones yourself, as a rectangle or with up to eight corners, or let “Suggest zones from furniture” create them. “Suggest sensors” places multi-zone presence sensors until every zone is fully covered. The KL MZ tells up to 4 people apart.
The KL MZ also detects presence outside its zones, as far as it reaches. With the tick box “Also cover the rest of the room” the planner adds further presence sensors for the rest of the room. With a boundary on the KL MZ you mask out what it should not see, such as the hallway behind the open door. How to set up the zones on the device is explained in Setting up zones on the presence sensor.
What the room planner cannot do
The room planner is a guide and an aid for advice, not a promise that a presence sensor will detect exactly like this in your room. It is marked as beta. The planner uses a simplified model: it knows no sloping ceilings, no reflections on glass and metal and not the sensitivity you set on the device. How well the sensor detects only shows in your room: test the mounting spot on site, then fix the sensor and set the zones. Which height suits a wall, ceiling or room corner is explained in Mounting a presence sensor on the ceiling or wall.
Frequently asked questions about the room planner
Do I have to sign up or install anything?
No. The planner runs in the browser, on a computer as on a phone. It stores nothing on your device; the whole plan is in the link after the hash sign. With “Copy link” you save it or send it on.
Can I plan several rooms?
One room per link. For a second room you create a new plan and copy its link. Several rooms in one project are planned for a later stage.
How accurate is the range in the plan?
Ranges and detection angles come from the presence sensors' instructions, the edge for presence from experience with the devices. Doors, curtains, furniture and settings on the device affect the result, so it is calculated, not measured. Test the mounting spot before you drill.
Which presence sensor should I choose?
Under “+ Sensor” choose what the sensor should do and tap “Suggest sensors”. The planner picks the models and places them in the right spot. For rooms deeper than 6 m this is usually the KL LD, for zones and several people the KL MZ. All models compared side by side are in the overview of presence sensors.