The Aqara Pet Feeder C1: Smart Feeding Simplified

Table of Contents

Introduction to The Aqara Pet Feeder C1

This week on HomeKit News, the Aqara Pet Feeder C1 with Zigbee… On this occasion we’re looking at a new product from Aqara, although to save some of you some time, this is not HomeKit compatible. However, it will work with Siri Shortcuts, and more, as I’ll go into later. So the product in question is the Smart Pet Feeder C1, which will work with Amazon and Google, as well as Aqara, of course. As already mentioned, you can control it with your voice using Siri, and as it’s a zigbee 3.0 device, you’re going to need one of these hubs in order to control it, for automations and scenes. Of these hubs, the Aqara G3 is especially useful, as it just happens to have ‘Pet Detection’ functionality. Here are some basic specs, and aside from using zigbee 3.0, it can work off batteries. It has the ability to keep your food dry, you can set up feeding schedules, or use it in automations. and the C1 can hold up to four litres of dried dog (or cat) food. As this is the international model, it has a manual that comes in the following languages, as well as English, of course. Although Aqara sent me the international model for a review, I did actually purchase the Chinese model shown here, that I’ve actually been using for a while now. They are pretty much the same, except that the Chinese model can’t be added to International servers, and as such won’t work with Google or Amazon.

Unboxing The Aqara Pet Feeder C1

Let’s see what’s in the box; so first is the main device itself that contains the food and dishes it out, as well as a lid to keep the food dry. We have a packet of desiccant to keep moisture at bay. A stainless steel bowl for the food, the bowl Tray that connects the bowl and the feeder, a power cable, and finally an instruction manual. I’ll put it all together now, which is pretty easy, starting with the desiccant that fits inside the lid. The dish and holder clip onto the base of the feeder. You pop the lid on, then you just connect the coaxial cable to the back, and you’re done. Aqara don’t provide a power brick, so you need to source one of these yourself. A quick look at the underside reveals a battery compartment designed for 3 D-size batteries, to keep the device working in the event power goes down. Next to that is a speaker, the use of which I’ll reveal shortly.

How The Aqara Pet Feeder C1 Works

So, how does it work? well it’s actually quite simple in a way, with a pair of cogs, both of which have a series of blades connected to them. The upper three-bladed Cog pushes the food along so that it gets fed through a hole, then puts food into six little portions. When you press the feeding button, these portions are moved around until the food enters a chute that then sends the food into the dish. Time to put some food into the machine so you can see how the internal parts work with dog food in a real world situation. You can see the food being moved along by the blades at the top, which eventually end up in the sections below, before finally falling down the Chute and into the feeding dish. One thing to note is that the top blades are made of rubber, so there is a little bit of give in them.

Food and Feeding Options

When it comes to dog food, only dry food is going to work, obviously, but you also have limits on the size of the biscuit you can use. My dog likes these biscuits but they’re too large for the machine, with the ideal size being between 2 and 12 millimetres in diameter. I do have some small biscuits that work well, as these are much smaller at only eight millimetres in diameter, but the dog just doesn’t like them, so eventually I settled on this food from Cesar, which has different pieces but all of which are small enough to fit through the feeder.

Connecting The Aqara Pet Feeder C1

As this is in an Aqara device and uses Zigbee, you need to install it via their app and connect it to a suitable Hub, so click the ‘Plus’ icon, select the ‘Home Appliances’ category, then select the Pet Feeder. Choose from your preferred Hub, and follow the on-screen instructions to pair the C1 to the hub. You then choose its location and name it, and you’re pretty much done. The C1 has three buttons, two of which you’re unlikely to use very much. So the first one is for pairing or confirming that the device is connected, whilst the second button issues a portion of food. The third button is for recording a sound so that your dog knows it’s feeding time, although as you’ll see later, it’s not really up to the task, in my opinion.

App Features and Feeding Plans

In the Aqara app, you can set the feeding amount, which you can set up as multiples of one portion. Each of the six compartments that holds the food count as one portion, which is around eight grams or a third of an ounce. You can then determine in the app how many of these portions or servings constitute one meal for your dog, which can be adjusted on a meal-by-meal basis, if you wish. The app has an automatic feeding plan that allows you to set the amount of portions, and the time for each meal. The feeding plan is set at three meals per day, but you can add or remove extra meals and change the feeding times as you wish, as well as customise when the feeding plan is active.

Custom Audio and Automations

I mentioned the third button can record custom audio, which is designed to call your dog for meal times, which I’ll demonstrate here. “Dinner time”… Personally, I don’t find the audio nearly loud enough, that tends to get drowned out by the sound of the food hitting the steel dish anyway, which my dog identifies more readily. Going back to the subject of the feeding plan, and I prefer to use a series of automations, which take more to set up initially, but make the process even more customisable.

Smart Automations with The Aqara Pet Feeder C1

First of all I turn off the feeding plan. Then I’ve created three automations; one for each meal – 8:30am, 12:30pm, and 5:30pm. I then created three additional automations that turned these feeding automations off until they’re next needed, if someone has fed the dog earlier than planned. As an example, for the 12:30pm feeding time, if someone feeds the dog up to an hour before that time, this will disable the 12:30pm feeding event, there will be a delay of 59 minutes, before the automation is then reactivated in time for the next time this automation is needed. You can also create a similar automation that involves the Aqara Camera Hub G3. In this case, with pet detection active, if the G3 detects a pet, up to an hour before the scheduled feeding time, it’ll issue the food, then disable the relevant feeding Automation, and reactivate it for next time.

Testing The Aqara Pet Feeder C1

So here’s the pet feeder being tested with the help of our dog. Once the pet feeder issues a few portions of food – as you can see here – the sound of the biscuits hitting the steel bowl is usually enough to let him know when food is ready. Note that whilst the dog would be considered a medium-sized dog, I’ve placed the feeder on a plastic stool, so that the feeding bowl is not too low and therefore a strain on his neck. If you choose to manually control the C1 rather than Crouch down every time to reach the button, you can of course use Siri Shortcuts, but you can also assign any one of the numerous Aqara Wireless buttons to do the same. Here are a range of such controllers that Aqara make, although not all of them are available internationally, but you get the picture. Additionally, if you’re able to find it, or you happen to live in China, you can also use the new Aqara Magic Switch S1E, which in addition to having three wired buttons to control lights, also has six programmable buttons that are also exposed to HomeKit. I’ll be doing a full video on this product soon, so make sure you’ve subscribe so you don’t miss it.

Pros and Cons of The Aqara Pet Feeder C1

Onto the Pros & Cons, and while many pet owners prefer to feed their dogs or cats themselves, for some people with mobility issues, this could considerably lighten a job that has to be usually done three times a day. The large, four litre tank also helps, so you’re not constantly worrying that you need to fill it every other day like you might have to do with a ‘pet water fountain’, for example. The customisation you can get with the feeding routines really makes it all very easy for you, but with automations like the ones I’ve already demonstrated, you can go even more granular quite easily. With Siri Shortcuts, you can include the pet feeding sessions in with all manner of other functions, or just use it to feed the dog with a quick voice instruction. Now, of course it’s not HomeKit compatible, but that’s due to the category simply not existing in HomeKit yet, but as it works with many other Aqara devices that are HomeKit compatible anyway, it’s pretty close in many ways, even without taking Siri Shortcuts into account. The only a slight negative point is that for my use case, the food tray is quite low to the ground, and even with our recently departed Beagle this was a little too low for him, so I think this is more suited to short-legged dogs like dachshunds and cats, of course.