Whether you’re in a different part of your house or hundreds of miles away, monitoring your sump pump remotely is an excellent way to ensure your system is functioning as intended. There are several ways to do this, from sump pump alarms that send text or email alerts to devices that let you monitor electricity usage at the outlet your sump pump is plugged into.
Smart Sump Pump Alarms
Sump pump alarms are designed to alert you when the water level in the sump basin rises to within 6 inches of the top. Many modern sump pump alarms include smart features, such as sending texts to your cell phone when the situation with your sump pump requires your attention. Connected to your home’s wifi, these alarms allow remote monitoring of your property and pump. Many models include both an audible alarm you can hear while present at the property and text, email, and/or app alerts you can access from anywhere. Here is a selection of wifi-enabled sump pump alarms from Amazon.
Smart Plugs to Monitor Electricity Usage
Smart plugs track how much energy is used by the devices plugged into them. The principle here is simple: plug smart plug into outlet, plug sump pump into smart plug. Using your home’s wifi setup, the smart plug communicates with its own dedicated app or your smart home system, like Alexa, Home Assistant, Samsung SmartThings, or other smart home systems. (Consult manufacturer info for specifics on which devices connect to your system.)
Available data can include everything from on and off times to total energy usage. Historical data is possible with some systems, and this can be handy if you’re wondering what times of year your sump pump works hardest. This PumpSpy Sump Pump Smart Outlet product combines a smart plug and a water sensor with wifi capability.
There are many smart plugs on the market; prices range from $15 to $75. Some popular and well-reviewed models include the Amazon Smart Plug, Kasa Smart Plug, eufy by Anker Smart Plug, and Kasa Outdoor Smart Plug.
Sump Pumps with Smart Capability
If you will be replacing your primary sump pump, or if you plan to install a battery-powered secondary sump pump, a wifi-enabled model might be a good choice. Wifi-enabled sump pumps, whether primary or secondary, provide both pumping capability and monitoring features. Popular brands that make both primary and secondary smart pumps include PumpSpy, Basement Watchdog, and Wayne. These brands sell primary-secondary combo kits as well as individual primary and secondary pumps.
Sump Basin Water Level Sensors
Beyond monitoring how often, how hard, and how long your sump pump is running, you might want to track how frequently and how quickly water fills (or overflows) your sump basin. This data can tell you how water levels fluctuate inside your basin seasonally and over the course of an individual storm event, and that can help you make decisions about equipment purchases, sump pump system maintenance, and potential changes to your landscaping you can make to direct rain water away from your foundation.
To monitor water levels inside or around your sump basin, you’ll need a water level sensor. There are several types of sensors on the market, including ultrasonic detectors, high/low water level sensors, and water leak sensors.
Ultrasonic Detectors
Ultrasonic sensors use high frequency ultrasonic waves to detect liquid levels. They are inexpensive and widely available, but some home DIY-ers have found that they aren’t well suited to use in sump basins because the equipment and plumbing inside the basin creates a crowded environment where the sensor has a hard time distinguishing true readings from noise.
This video and followup commentary by its creator, John’s DIY Playground, detail one homeowner’s efforts. This Instructables article documents another individual’s ultrasonic detectors project.
High/Low Water Level Sensors
Other sensors use simpler mechanisms to detect water levels — a probe-like wand with a cover that floats up when submerged. It’s important to note that although this type of sensor sits inside the basin, like a float switch, these sensors are not designed to turn on the sump pump, but to alert the homeowner about the water level.
A wifi-enabled model by Zoeller that’s typical of this type of sensor uses a wand placed inside the basin to detect water levels. Held in place by a metal bracket, the sensor sounds an alarm when water hits a certain level. This video describes the product.
The well-reviewed Proteus L5 is covered in detail in this homeowner-made unboxing video; it’s similar to the Zoeller model. With the Proteus L5, as with some other sensors of this type, you set the level at which the sensor alerts, which means you can set it to alert when the water hits a certain level or goes above or falls below it.
Water Leak Sensors
Another type of sensor detects water atop a flat surface. These are commonly used to detect water pooling under or around appliances such as air conditioners, refrigerators or washing machines; homeowners have applied the same sensors to sump pump basins, usually to give early-stage warning of flooding just outside the basin or on top of the lid. One of the best-reviewed sensors of this type, Proteus Aquo, detects water levels as low as 1/16 inch, connects to your home wifi, and offers both a loud alarm and text/email/phone alerts (configurable for multiple numbers or email addresses, in case more than one member of the household needs notifications).
Combining Smart Technologies
While using any one of the monitoring tools described in this article is better than doing nothing, if your home is in an especially high-risk area or has a history of serious flooding, you might want to use multiple types of sensors to protect your property.
The homeowner at the YouTube channel Twintown DIY did exactly that, using water leak/moisture sensors, high/low water level sensors, and a smart plug to monitor his sump pump system. The entire setup is detailed in his video, “Smart Home Pump Monitoring with SmartThings Sensors.” The video is a good look at how to use several of the technologies described in this article as well as how to create a thoughtfully redundant alert system.