What is Helix Fi app?
The Helix Fi app is a digital dashboard that helps you manage your home Wi Fi network and your connected home. It gives you complete control at your fingertips: set up your Wi-Fi in minutes, get the password for your wireless network, see who’s online, troubleshoot problems and manage family members’ network use with features like Pause Device and Parental Control.
Good to know
The Helix Fi app is free and included in all Helix plans. Take time to explore all its features to make the most of Helix.
How to download the Helix Fi app
- To install the Helix Fi app, click the link that matches your device’s operating system:
- Use your Helix ID and password to log into the app.
Understanding Helix Fi app’s sections
The Helix Fi app is organized into four practical sections to help you better manage your home’s Wi-Fi network. These sections are represented as tabs located at the bottom of the screen.
| Overview • Sharing your Wi-Fi • Restarting your gateway • Enabling Advanced Security |
Connect • Displaying your network name and password • Viewing and setting up connected devices • Interrupting a device’s Internet access |
| People • Adding people • Setting up unassigned devices • Setting up profiles and usage limits for each person |
Home • Linking home automation devices • Managing your home automation devices’ functionalities • Controlling your home automation devices |
How to use the Helix Fi app
After downloading the Helix Fi app, you will have access to a range of handy features. You will be able to:
Keeping an eye on connected devices
The Connect tab allows you to see the devices connected to your network, to customize their display or link them to a profile, and to pause them or delete them from your device list. Learn more about managing devices.
Creating profiles and managing their Wi-Fi use
Once profiles are created, you can use features such as Downtime Schedule to pause all devices assigned to a person or Active Time Limit to set a time limit on the use of its connected devices. Learn more about managing people connected to the network.
Enabling the Active Time Details feature
This feature provides you with a report on the active time of 100+ top-ranked apps across a specific person’s devices when connected to your network. Learn more about Active Time Details.
Setting up Parental Control
Enabling Parental Control allows you to restrict access to age-inappropriate or potentially explicit content on websites and apps. Learn more about Parental Control.
Enabling Advanced Security options
Advanced Security provides you protection against malicious sites and helps prevent phishing by monitoring your devices’ activity and sending you notifications of suspicious activity. Learn more about Advanced Security.
The Helix Fi app and VPNs
Using a virtual private network (VPN) feature, such as iCloud Private Relay offered by Apple, to allow anonymous browsing by protecting your data and location, can:
- Compromise Parental Control: Since traffic is encrypted directly at the device level, the Helix Fi gateway can no longer recognize and block web pages and searches containing age-inappropriate content.
- Compromise the proper functioning of Helix Fi Advanced Security: Because your browsing requests are encrypted as soon as they leave your device, the Advanced Security feature is no longer able to detect threats and effectively protect you by blocking them.
- Compromise Active Time Details results: Device activity cannot be tracked if you are using a VPN to access the Internet.
In order to best control your family’s digital activity, we recommend you do not use a VPN, disable iCloud Private Relay, or use a browser other than Safari to enjoy fully secure browsing.
FAQ about using Helix Fi app
Make sure you are using the latest version of your device’s operating system and the latest version of the Helix Fi app to ensure it works properly and to get the latest features.
Beta versions may not be fully supported. Windows and Amazon phones are not supported. The Helix Fi app can be installed on an iPad, but it has not been optimized for it.
Create a profile for your children and assign their devices to it. Go to People and select your child’s profile. In the profile parameters, select Parental Control, then On to only allow access to content deemed appropriate for all ages.
In the People section, choose a profile from the list and select Active Time Details. Click in the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy acceptance box at the bottom of the screen. Tap How Active Details Work (above the Status field) to obtain the details of the Active Time Details feature. Tap Enable.
More information about the Helix Fi app’s Active Time Details feature
The Helix Fi app’s Full Network Test feature allows you to quickly test the Wi-Fi connections of your network and your various devices.
When you subscribe to Helix Internet, you can get the compatible smart equipment you want and combine all your devices on your network by linking them to the Helix Fi app for centralized and streamlined management of your smart home.
In the Helix Fi app’s Connection section, tap the blue link See network below your Wi-Fi network’s name. Select Advanced Settings in the More section at the bottom of the page. Select Port Forwarding from the menu, then Add Port Forward.
If you’re using Parental Control features, it’s possible that the MAC Randomization feature will impact certain Helix Fi app profile features and that you need to make changes to assigned devices.
See how to restore the Helix Fi app’s functionality despite the Random MAC feature
