Connect your server
The first time you open Fregata Mobile, a walkthrough connects it to your NVR. It takes about three minutes, and the bar across the top shows how far you are. Do this later, at the top right of every step, leaves it: the app keeps what you’ve entered, and Settings › Set up this iPhone again starts it over.
Connect for the first time
Section titled “Connect for the first time”- Welcome. Tap Get started.
- Sync with iCloud? Leave Sync with iCloud on to bring your server across from another iPhone or iPad, or to have this one ready for the next. Tap Continue.
- Where is your NVR? Type its address under At home, and under Away if you have one for when you’re out. Tap Next.
- Sign in. Enter the username and password you use for your NVR’s web interface, then tap Connect.
- Connected. The app says whether your account is an administrator or a viewer and lists the cameras it found. Tap Next.
- Alerts on this iPhone. Tap Allow notifications, then choose Allow when iOS asks.
- Alerts from Frigate. Tap Check my server, and follow Set up alerts. To leave it for now, tap Finish alerts later.
- You’re set. Tap Start watching.
The rest of this page explains each step.
Sync with iCloud
Section titled “Sync with iCloud”If you’ve already set Fregata Mobile up on another device signed in to the same Apple Account, this step finds it. The card says Found your setup in iCloud, and Continue takes you straight to signing in: the address is already filled in. Set up a different server ignores what was found.
On a first device, the step says there’s nothing in iCloud yet. Your server is saved there as you go, ready for the next device.
Turning Sync with iCloud off keeps everything on this iPhone only. You can change it later in Settings › iCloud Sync; see iCloud Sync for exactly what travels and how it’s protected.
Your NVR’s address
Section titled “Your NVR’s address”- At home: the address that works on your home Wi-Fi, usually an IP address and port such as
https://192.168.1.10:8971. - Away: an address that works from anywhere, such as a Tailscale or VPN address or a domain of your own. Optional.
- Advanced: custom headers, for an NVR behind a login page such as Cloudflare Access.
Not sure of the address? Open your NVR in a browser on a computer and copy what’s in the address bar. Use port 8971, the one that asks for a sign-in, rather than 5000: while sign-in is on, alerts registered over port 5000 are silently lost. See Compatibility.
You don’t choose between the two addresses: the app tries both, uses whichever answers, and remembers which one works on each Wi-Fi network. Either one on its own is enough.
| You reach your NVR… | At home | Away |
|---|---|---|
| Only on your home network | Its local address | Empty |
| At home, and through a VPN or Tailscale when out | Its local address | Its Tailscale or VPN address |
| Through one public address everywhere | Empty | The public address |
Away from home, live video, recordings and the picture in each alert all need the Away address. Without one, alerts still arrive away from home, but with no picture, and in Frigate’s own wording rather than yours. See Away from home.
If an address looks wrong for its field, a note under the fields says so. For example, a
192.168.… address under Away won’t reach your server from elsewhere, and an http://
address under Away travels unencrypted unless a VPN encrypts it.
Custom headers
Section titled “Custom headers”If your NVR sits behind something that asks for its own sign-in before Frigate’s, such as
Cloudflare Access, open Advanced and tap Add a header for each header it needs.
Cloudflare Access needs two: CF-Access-Client-Id and CF-Access-Client-Secret. The app sends
them with every request, including the ones made in the background to put a picture in an
alert. The values are kept in the Keychain.
Sign in
Section titled “Sign in”- If you have an administrator account, sign in with it: the app can then set your server up for alerts by itself.
- Username: the same one you use in your NVR’s web interface.
- Password: kept in this iPhone’s Keychain and sent only to your own server.
If your NVR has no sign-in at all, leave both empty and tap Connect.
If Connect fails, a message under the fields says why, in plain words: the address doesn’t answer, the password was refused, the certificate needs a decision, and so on. Each message and its fix is in Can’t connect.
Administrator or viewer
Section titled “Administrator or viewer”Frigate gives every account a role. The app reads it when you sign in and says which you have.
Both can watch every camera, scrub recordings, browse Review and Explore, and receive alerts. An administrator can also change the server itself:
| Administrator | Viewer | |
|---|---|---|
| Live view, recordings, Review, Explore | ✓ | ✓ |
| Receive alerts, and choose which reach this iPhone | ✓ | ✓ |
| Let the app set up alerts on the server | ✓ | Gives you the steps to send to an administrator |
| Turn a camera’s detection, recording or snapshots on or off | ✓ | — |
| Turn a camera’s alerts off for everyone | ✓ | — |
| Create and edit camera groups | ✓ | — |
| Restart the server, and read its logs | ✓ | Logs only, where the server allows it |
A viewer that wants to do more can tap Back and sign in with an administrator account instead. You can also change the account at any time in Settings › Connection.
Alerts on this iPhone
Section titled “Alerts on this iPhone”- Show a picture: the frame the camera saw, in the alert itself.
- Upgrade to a short video: replaces the picture with a few seconds of footage, about 25 seconds after the alert. Uses mobile data when you’re not on Wi-Fi.
- Break through Focus: alerts arrive as Time Sensitive, so they show while a Focus, Do Not Disturb included, is on. It doesn’t make a sound on a silenced iPhone.
All three are on to begin with, and all three are in Settings › Device Notification Settings later. See Pictures, video and sound and Focus and Time Sensitive alerts.
Set up notifications later skips alerts for now. Nothing else depends on them.
Certificates
Section titled “Certificates”
Frigate secures its web interface with a certificate it makes for itself, which iOS can’t check on its own. How the app handles it depends on the address:
- An address on your home network, such as
192.168.1.10: the app trusts the certificate the first time and remembers it. There’s no question to answer. - Any other address: the app asks first, showing the certificate’s fingerprint. If you want to be sure, compare it with the one your server shows, then tap Trust it.
- A certificate iOS already trusts, such as one from Let’s Encrypt on a reverse proxy: no question either.
Once trusted, the certificate is pinned. If your server ever presents a different one, the app stops and asks again, under This server’s certificate has changed. That’s expected after you rebuild or reinstall Frigate, which makes a new certificate. If you haven’t, tap Not now and find out why before trusting it. See Certificate questions.
Change the connection later
Section titled “Change the connection later”Settings › Connection holds everything the walkthrough asked for.
An account with only the Viewer role still works. You can view your cameras, and notifications can still be delivered. What it cannot do is change your server's settings or restart it, so you would have to make those changes in Frigate yourself and restart it. Server Notification Setup notices both on its own.
- Name: optional. Used instead of the address wherever the app names this server. Worth setting if you have more than one.
- Now: which address the app is using at this moment, and its host.
- At home and Away: the two addresses.
- Advanced: custom headers.
- Administrator account: the username and password.
- Test connection: signs in, then asks each address for Frigate’s version. It changes nothing, and shows a result under each address.
After changing the address or the password, the app uses the new ones straight away. If an alert’s picture is missing afterwards, tap Refresh connection in Settings › Diagnostics: it hands the new details to the part of the app that fetches pictures in the background.
More than one server
Section titled “More than one server”Settings › Add another server adds a second NVR, such as a holiday home or a relative’s house. It opens the same Connection screen for the new server.
With more than one server, a server button appears at the top left of every tab. It shows which server you’re looking at, and switches between them. Settings follows it: the Server section is about the server it names. See More than one server.