Car Hotspot

Rating: 
5
Your rating: None Average: 5 (2 votes)

Car Hotspot (harbour-carhotspot) for Sailfish OS

Car Hotspot(github) is an intelligent, automated Wi-Fi hotspot management utility for Sailfish OS. It seamlessly turns your smartphone into an in-car Wi-Fi router by activating mobile tethering the moment your phone connects to your car's Bluetooth hands-free / infotainment system, and safely turning it off when you leave.

 Features

  • Smart Automation: Automatically activates Wi-Fi hotspot upon pairing with your designated car Bluetooth device.
  • Grace Period (Delayed Shutdown): Configurable disconnect grace timer (0 to 10 minutes). Avoids turning off the hotspot during brief disconnections (e.g., fuel stops or momentary signal drops).
  • Cellular Keep-Alive: Automatically ensures mobile data is powered on and connected via ConnMan technology before starting tethering.
  • Battery Drain Protection: User-defined minimum battery threshold (5%–50%). Will not start or will automatically power down if the battery is low and the device is not on a charger.
  • Roaming Guard: Protects against unexpected carrier charges by preventing auto-activation when roaming abroad.
  • Haptic Feedback & Sound: Haptic vibration confirmation (via NGF session bus) and sound cues when connected to the car and hotspot starts successfully.
  • Background Daemon & Autostart: Optional systemd --user background service (harbour-carhotspot.service) that monitors Bluetooth in the background and starts on phone boot.
  • System-Aware Localization: Follows system language settings (English and Bulgarian supported out of the box).
  • Active Silica UI & Cover: Real-time status banner, paired devices discovery, manual override, and cover actions.
    Screenshots: 
    Application versions: 
    AttachmentSizeDate
    File harbour-carhotspot-0.3.2-1.aarch64.rpm197.3 KB10/10/2026 - 17:34
    File harbour-carhotspot-0.3.2-1.armv7hl.rpm189.03 KB10/10/2026 - 17:34
    File harbour-carhotspot-0.4.0-1.aarch64.rpm218.24 KB16/10/2026 - 15:29
    File harbour-carhotspot-0.4.0-1.armv7hl.rpm209.66 KB16/10/2026 - 15:29
    File harbour-carhotspot-0.4.1-1.aarch64.rpm219.95 KB17/10/2026 - 13:14
    File harbour-carhotspot-0.4.1-1.armv7hl.rpm212 KB17/10/2026 - 13:14
    Changelog: 
    • Fixed background service after phone reboot: The background service now starts reliably after a reboot and automatically connects to the car's Bluetooth and starts the Hotspot without needing to open the app manually.
    • Fixed Wi-Fi remaining on after Hotspot stops: Wi-Fi is now properly turned off when the Hotspot shuts down if it was off before the Hotspot started, and only stays on if it was already enabled prior to tethering.
    • Fixed disappearing notifications: Notifications now remain in the notification bar / Events View after the popup banner disappears, instead of being automatically cleared after a few seconds.

    Comments

    Alexanderius's picture

    This app is exactly what i wanted for my car, 5 stars!

    psyhlo's picture

    thanks!

    sistux's picture

    On XA2 can't be installed, unfortunatelly

    psyhlo's picture

    Hi @sistux,

    Could you please check which Sailfish OS version you are running?

    A couple of things to keep in mind for Xperia XA2:

    1. Xperia XA2 uses the armv7hl architecture (32-bit), not aarch64. Please ensure you are downloading the armv7hl.rpm package.
    2. If your device is running an older Sailfish OS release (SFOS 4.x), it might be missing newer glibc dependencies or zstd rpm compression.

    What error message do you get when installing via terminal (devel-su pkcon install-local <file>.armv7hl.rpm)?

    lorenzo's picture

    Beautiful.