Rachio Sprinkler Standby

A backyard rig shares the yard with the irrigation. ARIS pairs with a Rachio smart sprinkler controller so your lawn watering never rains on an open telescope: while any rig is powered on, ARIS holds the watering schedules you choose in standby, then lets them resume on their own once the last rig shuts down.

It’s built fail-safe. Every error path — a network blip, an expired token, Rachio’s API having a bad minute — leaves the schedules paused, never accidentally running. And it’s connection-only: ARIS talks to Rachio over Rachio’s own cloud API. Nothing touches your controller’s wiring, and you never move a wire to set it up.

What you need

A Rachio controller already set up in the Rachio app, and your Rachio Personal API Token (free, from your Rachio account — steps below). That’s it. ARIS does the rest from the app.

Get your Rachio API token

Your Personal API Token is a private key that lets ARIS pause and resume schedules on your behalf. To find it:

1. Sign in to the Rachio web app at app.rach.io (the same account as your controller).
2. Open Account Settings.
3. Choose Get API Key and copy the token it reveals.

In the ARIS setup screen, the Get my token link opens this page for you.

Caution

Treat the token like a password — it can control your sprinklers. ARIS stores it on your rig, never in the cloud, and never displays it back to you in full: once saved, the field shows only the last few characters so you can confirm which token is stored.

Enter and test your token

Open Settings → Rachio Sprinkler and you’ll land on the setup screen.

1. Turn on Integration enabled — this is the master switch that lets ARIS pause Rachio schedules while rigs are on.
2. Paste your token into API Token. The field is masked; tap the eye icon to check what you pasted.
3. Tap Test connection. ARIS reaches Rachio and reports back what it found — for example, “Found 1 controller · 4 schedule rules.”
4. Tap Save.

If the test fails, ARIS shows the reason (most often a mistyped or expired token). Re-copy the token from app.rach.io and test again.

Choose what stands down

The Standby mode selector decides how much of your irrigation pauses when a rig powers on. Pick the one that matches your yard.

Pause specific schedules (recommended)

Most homes have one Rachio covering the whole property — including the area where the rig sets up. Pause specific schedules lets you stand down only the schedules that would water the rig, while the rest of the yard keeps its normal watering.

After a successful test, ARIS lists your Rachio schedule rules as cards. Each card shows the schedule’s name, which controller it’s on, and the zones it runs. Tick only the schedules that water where your rig lives.

In the example above the backyard schedule is ticked — it waters right where the rig sets up — while the front-yard schedule is left running. The green banner up top is the live status: it reads All clear when nothing is held, and switches to Currently paused while a rig is on.

Covers all zones

If a schedule runs every zone on the controller, ARIS flags it with a COVERS ALL ZONES badge. Pausing that one schedule stops watering across your whole property, not just the rig area — tick it only if that’s really what you want.

Nothing is selected for you. Pausing every schedule would dry out your whole yard on any night you image, so the choice is always yours to make deliberately.

Tip

If the picker says No schedule rules found, your Rachio has no schedules split out yet. Open the Rachio app and give the rig area its own schedule — then the picker can pause just that one. The empty state links to Rachio’s own guide for creating a schedule.

Pause the whole controller

If a whole controller only ever waters the rig area — or you’d simply rather stop everything to be safe — switch to Pause whole controller and pick the controller(s) to put in standby. Every schedule on a selected controller is held while a rig is on.

This mode also lives under Advanced — fallback on the schedule-picker screen, so you can keep specific-schedule pausing as your primary choice and still have whole-controller standby available.

How standby behaves at night

Once it’s set up, sprinkler standby is completely hands-off:

• A rig powers on → ARIS puts your chosen schedules into standby within moments.
• While rigs stay on → ARIS quietly re-asserts the pause in the background, so a schedule can never slip through during a long session.
• The last rig powers off → ARIS releases the schedules automatically. Your normal watering resumes on its own — there’s nothing to switch back.

The setup screen shows a live status banner so you always know where things stand:

Banner	Meaning
Currently paused: N rules	Standby is active; schedules are held and will release when all rigs go offline.
Pausing schedules… / Restoring schedules…	ARIS is applying or lifting standby right now.
All clear — no schedules paused	No rig is on, or nothing is selected; watering runs normally.
Partial	Some schedules couldn’t be paused, so ARIS engaged whole-controller standby as a fallback to keep water off.
Standby error	Something went wrong — details appear just below. Standby fails toward off, so schedules stay paused.

Note

The same status surfaces as a chip on the rig dashboard, so you can confirm at a glance that the sprinklers are standing down before you leave the rig for the night.

Notes

• The token lives on your rig. Sprinkler settings are stored per-rig, so every device you sign in from sees the same configuration.
• One controller, mixed yard? Use Pause specific schedules and give the rig area its own Rachio schedule — it’s the cleanest way to protect the rig without leaving the rest of the garden dry on every imaging night.
• Rachio was our first sprinkler integration. ARIS frames this as sprinkler standby generally, starting with Rachio; support for more controller brands may follow.