Litter Robot 3 Connect Onboard fail at last step

Hi!

I require your help regarding a problem I’m encountering.

Description:
I’m owner of a Litter Robot 3 with Connect kit. When I try to onboard my litter robot using the App it fails at the last step (step 5 when the information are sent to the robot, certificates + internet credentials, the app says that the robot is going Online and just after a simple message saying to try again:
“Your litter robot failed to onboard.” (See screenshot)

Hardware concerned:
Litter Robot 3 Connect + Android Smartphone

Software concerned:
Litter Robot Connect App.

Troubleshooting steps already taken:
I tried all tutorials I found with reboot of my router + unplug 15 sec and start again the procedure.
I have simplified at maximum my wifi with a very simple SSID + pass of only 10 letters without special chars.
Ihave also tried the 5 minutes unplgued tutorial for other issues of connection (but it seems to apply only to wifi connection once LR is already enrolled)

Additional information:
I have screenshots of the steps from my phone if necessary.

Thank you so much in advance for your help!

Good day,

We apologize that you are having issues onboarding your new Litter-Robot Connect. Here are steps to solve connection issues:

Please enable “Airplane Mode” before beginning to prevent the smart network switch from interfering with the onboarding process.

Please follow the steps below:

  1. Reboot your router.
  2. Completely close the Litter-Robot app.
  3. While the unit is at the Home position with the solid blue light, unplug your unit from the BASE, not the wall.
  4. Wait 15 seconds, plug it back in, and allow it to cycle until the solid blue light comes on (“Ready” status).
  5. Open the app and follow the steps.

Please make sure you complete the process within 10 minutes and that you are broadcasting off 2.4 GHZ.

If you still experience issues onboarding, please check for the following:

  • SSID network names must be under 31 characters

  • Network passwords must be between 8-31 characters and cannot have slashes, periods or spaces ( \ / . )

  • Unable to see hidden networks

  • Unable to view MAC address. Third party apps can.

  • Unable to connect to a network that does not have a password

  • Check to see if the Litter-Robot Hotspot is broadcasting all the time. The easiest way to check would be to check your WiFi network options to see if the Litter-Robot is listed prior to enabling the unit’s hotspot (pressing Cycle and Empty). It should only broadcast after it’s been enabled.

Customer Service Code: 4045

We are so sorry for any inconveniences you have experienced. We appreciate your time and patience while working with us. If you are still having issues onboarding, please advise.

Here is a great video that shows you step by step on how to get everything set up with your WiFi:

Best regards,

Reply I have already done the mentioned steps and check.
I had only not checked the last point about the boradcasting of the LitterRobot wifi, I did it just now and it is not broadcasting the litter robot wifi until I enable it via the Cycle+Empty press for 3 seconds.

I’m lost with no traces :confused:
The last display of the App before saying the it Failed to Onboard is :
“WIFI Confirmed Litter-Robot is coming online”

1 Like

FIXED !!!

Finally I was able to onboard it and here are the details and issues:

After reading for the ten times all the details of your procedure I realize that at the beginning you ask to ensure to be in “aiplane” mode.
I did it but as the application need 1st to be logged in on the server with account, so not compatible to start with airplane mode.
And secondly during the 3rd step of providing a name for the robot in the app it also asked to have internet access (cellular or wifi).
Finaly when displaying the Finishing up message it try again to access your servers through internet.

How did I fix it is not “normal procedure”.

  1. First of all I deactivate all known wifi of my smartphone to prevent any automatic connection to wifi.
  2. I start the application with my cellular data active to login and launch the process.
  3. I switch to airplane mode on my smartphone and continue the process until the step where I provide name to the robot
  4. I reactivate my data for the naming step
  5. I switch to airplane mode again and those until final step and message “Finishing up”
  6. when this message is displayed I activate again my cellular data.

And Tadaaaaa it works.

Thank you for you message anyway that indicated me that the process itself was very sensitive to the connexion status of the smartphone.
It is potentially different depending on the kind of smartphone and OS level you have.

Anyway happy that it worled and hope that Litter Robot will be able to refine their app and the way they onboard the robot. the process of setuping wifi from the smartphone is a good and secure idea, the way it is implemnted needs to be reviewed to works on all cases :slightly_smiling_face:

4 Likes

Hi @Cassien3,

We are glad that you managed to connect it :slight_smile:

Litter Robot knows about these issues and they are working on fixing it!

Thank you for detailed answer.

Thank you for providing these steps. This fixed my issue as well! I was starting to get very frustrated.

2 Likes

Big tip if you setup a Guest Network for your LitterRobot!! 02/18/2020

If you guest network requires that you log into the network through a webpage (ex Linksys wrt1200ac), the LitterRobot and will fail/hang trying to send Wi-Fi credentials even if you follow the mentioned steps above (disabling data/otherwifi/airplane)

2 Likes

First time I connected my robot, your airplane off and on mode worked for me. However, second time I had spotty coverage.

This is VERY frustrating. Probably an android specific thing.

My solution was quite different.

1 disabled cellular network / data
2 when I was ready to connect to the robots wifi, I forgot my wifi network(s) so that it wont reconnect
3 when I got to the final step where it hangs, I connected to my wifi
4 forgot to add, obviously turn your cellular data back on :smiley:

The moment I switched back to the app, it showed COMPLETED.

Just figured I’d share a simpler, alternative approach, for those in rural areas.

3 Likes

I have tried all of these solutions/steps. Still hangs at step 5 “litter-robot ready -sending key” … and then times out.

Have you bought it from RobotShop?

If so, what is your order ID?

1 Like

No … bought it from www.litter-robot.com. I am just trying to find any troubleshooting help. I have submitted a ticket to www.litter-robot.com, and their email said they would answer within the next several days.

Litter-Robot believes there is something wrong with the board. They are shipping a new base to me. Thank you for your help!

3 Likes

Hey @lslaten,

Good. We hope that new base will solve the issue!

2 Likes

I’m SO glad I found this thread, as I was having the exact same issue. Ended up having to get a new base from Litter-Robot, but even with it, I had troubles getting it to work. Using a combination of everything above, I finally managed to get it going. Below were the steps I ended up doing:

  1. Logged out of app, closed it, then force-stopped it
  2. Forgot my wifi network, so that my phone would not automatically reconnect
  3. If it was still there, forgot the Litter-Robot wifi network, too
  4. Turned off wifi, so that cellular data was used
  5. Re-opened app and signed in
  6. Continued all steps while still on cellular data until prompted to connect to Litter-Robot wifi.
  7. Turned on wifi, selected Litter-Robot network and entered password
  8. When prompted, selected my home network and re-entered password. This was done from the app, NOT from my wifi connections

After all these steps, it finally worked and I’m now good to go.

3 Likes

@Raiven05

Thanks for sharing.

1 Like

Hi,

I am experiencing problem similar to many users here - and unable to enrol my Litter Robot 3 Connect in app / onto my wifi network. My litter robot / app are stuck on Step 5: “Sending Wi-Fi credentials”. I receive a message saying my SSID / credentials are invalid (they are accurate).

I have wasted hours on this. I have taken the following steps to troubleshoot:

  • Unplug the LR directly from base for varying times (15 seconds, 5 minutes), allow full cycle on restart;
  • Delete and reinstall app (iOS 13)
  • Restart router, and ensure signal is broadcast in 2.4 GhZ
  • Move LR next to router
  • Restart iPhone / try with iPad
  • Forgetting home wifi networks from my iOS device in the onboarding
  • Try variations of airplane mode troubleshooting, described here
  • Try using the bluetooth pairing option when prompted (or alternative disabling BT and skipping this prompt

This has been a time consuming and frustrating experience. I am very disappointed to have zero connectivity on this smart device.

Can you help with any suggestions?

Thanks,

1 Like

Hi @Gavicus!

Thank you for contacting us!

We saw this issue already with one customer. We contacted manufacturer but they still didn’t reply. We will push them again and we will let you know.

1 Like

Hi,

I tried everything mentioned in all messages, nothing works. Onboarding still fails with the message - Invalid Wi-Fi Credentials.

Finally, out of desperation, I tried the last thing - I created a Guest WiFi Network, with only 2.4GHz band on it, and FINALLY, I was able to successfully finish an onboarding.
My normal SSID is a tri-band of 2.4+5.1+5.1GHz with 20/40MHz channel bandwidth, apparently, LitterRobot can’t work with it.

Now, the question here - does it have to be on the same wifi as my phone to properly communicate with the app?
Or does the LitterRobot talk directly to the remote internet server, and wifi is needed only to get access to the internet?
And the app also only talks to remote server, and not the device directly?

Please confirm (or deny),
Thanks!

1 Like

Hey @andreiglotov!

When you do the configuration, the phone has to be within range of the Litter-Robot, on the same network. But once it is configured, the Litter-Robot is connected to the Litter-Robot server. Your app phone is connected to it as well. You don’t need to be on the same network once it has been configured, all goes through the network, which is why some customers have issues when the Litter-Robot network goes down for a few hours.

1 Like

Thanks for the confirmation.
It would be nice though if LitterRobot can be a bit more flexible about wifi channels.
After all, even my fairly old robot-vacuum has no problem connecting to 5GHz wifi channel.
Considering the price (high) of LitterRobot, you could have upgraded a wifi chip in it…

1 Like