Satellite started processing

The Satellite started processing trigger fires when one or more Assist satellite entitiesAn entity represents a sensor, actor, or function in Home Assistant. Entities are used to monitor physical properties or to control other entities. An entity is usually part of a device or a service. [Learn more] transition to the processing state. This happens after the satellite finishes capturing the voice command and hands it off to the speech-to-text and intent-processing pipeline.

Use it to automate actions during the brief moment the satellite is thinking. For example, create an automation to show a visual indicator on a display that the request is being processed, to log pipeline invocations for usage auditing, or to start a timeout helper that alerts you if processing takes longer than expected and may point to a resource-heavy pipeline.

Using this trigger from the user interface

If you prefer building automations visually, Home Assistant walks you through this trigger step by step. You pick what to watch, tweak a few options, and save. No YAML knowledge required.

To use this trigger in an automation:

1. Go to Settings > Automations & scenes.
2. Open an existing automation, or select Create automation > Create new automation.
3. In the When section, select Add trigger.
4. From the search box, search for and select Satellite started processing.
5. Select Add target and pick the Assist satellite you want to watch. You can also select an area, a floor, a device, or a label, as described in Targets.
6. Under Trigger when, pick Each, First, or All to control how the trigger behaves when multiple satellites are targeted, as described in Behavior.
7. Under For at least, you can set how long the satellite must keep reporting the processing state before the trigger fires. Leave it at zero to fire immediately.
8. Select Save.

Options in the UI

Using this trigger in YAML

If you work directly in YAML, or you want to know exactly what Home Assistant does under the hood, this section has the technical reference. It lists the field names you use in YAML, their types, and which ones are required.

In YAML, refer to this trigger as assist_satellite.started_processing. A basic example looks like this:

trigger: assist_satellite.started_processing
target:
  entity_id: assist_satellite.living_room

This fires every time assist_satellite.living_room starts processing a voice command.

Options in YAML

YAML sometimes provides additional options for more complex use cases that are not available through the UI.

Targets of the trigger

This trigger requires a target. The target is the object that Home Assistant will watch. You can select a single entityAn entity represents a sensor, actor, or function in Home Assistant. Entities are used to monitor physical properties or to control other entities. An entity is usually part of a device or a service. [Learn more], a device, an area, a floor, or a label as a target, and Home Assistant will watch every matching assist_satellite entity behind that target.

• Entity: one specific assist_satellite entity, such as assist_satellite.living_room.
• Device: every assist_satellite entity that belongs to a device.
• Area: every assist_satellite entity in a room or area.
• Floor: every assist_satellite entity on a floor.
• Label: every assist_satellite entity that shares a label.

You can also select different target types in one trigger. For example, you can add a specific entity and an area as targets in the same trigger to monitor both of them at once.

Behavior with multiple targets

When you target more than one entity (or select an area, floor, or label that contains several), the Trigger when option controls how the trigger responds:

• Each (default): the trigger fires every time any one of the targeted entities transitions. For example, if you monitor three motion sensors in the living room and someone walks past sensor 1, the automation fires. When they walk past sensor 2 a moment later, it fires again. Every individual event counts.
• First: the trigger fires only on the first transition in the targeted group, then waits until all targeted entities have reset before it fires again. For example, if you monitor the same three motion sensors, the automation fires when the first one picks up movement (someone entered the room). The other two firing afterward are ignored, so you get one notification per “someone walked in” event instead of three.
• All: the trigger fires only after the last targeted entity in the group has fired, meaning all of them are now in the expected state. For example, if you monitor the lights in the living room, bedroom, and hallway, the automation fires only once all three have turned off. This is useful for scenarios like “start the robot vacuum only after every light on the floor is off,” so you know the room is truly empty.

Good to know

• This trigger fires as soon as the satellite hands the captured audio to the speech-to-text and intent pipeline. The voice command has not yet been acted upon at this point.
• The processing state spans both speech-to-text transcription and intent recognition. For cloud-based pipelines, processing time is dominated by network round-trip latency, which is typically 100 ms to 500 ms on a fast connection, but can be several seconds under congestion. For local pipelines, total processing time depends on the speech recognition model and hardware, so it can range from one to several seconds.
• If you are using a cloud pipeline, keep in mind that processing requires network access. A slow or offline internet connection can keep the satellite in the processing state longer than usual.
• Satellites that have the Unavailable or Unknown state are skipped in the evaluation of multi-target behavior.

Try it yourself

Ready to test this? Go to Settings > Automations & scenes, create a new automation, and add this trigger. Save the automation, then change the state of the targeted entity to watch the trigger fire on your actual entitiesAn entity represents a sensor, actor, or function in Home Assistant. Entities are used to monitor physical properties or to control other entities. An entity is usually part of a device or a service. [Learn more].

More examples

Real scenarios where this trigger fires in automations and scripts. Copy any example and adapt it to your setup.

Automation: turn off a display when the satellite is processing to save energy

When a satellite starts processing a voice command, this automation turns off a nearby display that is no longer needed for input. Because the command has already been captured and is being interpreted, leaving the display on serves no purpose and wastes standby power. The display can be turned back on when the satellite returns to idle using the Satellite became idle trigger.

• Trigger: Satellite started processing
  • Target: Kitchen Assist satellite
• Action: Turn off switch
  • Target: Kitchen display switch

alias: "Turn off kitchen display while satellite is processing"
triggers:
  - trigger: assist_satellite.started_processing
    target:
      entity_id: assist_satellite.kitchen
actions:
  - action: switch.turn_off
    target:
      entity_id: switch.kitchen_display

Still stuck?

The Home Assistant community is quick to help: join Discord for real-time chat, post on the community forum with the trigger you’re using and what you expected to happen, or share on our subreddit /r/homeassistant.

Related triggers

These triggers work well alongside this one:

• Satellite started listening: Triggers after one or more Assist satellites start listening for a voice command.

• Satellite started responding: Triggers after one or more Assist satellites start playing back a response.

• Satellite became idle: Triggers after one or more Assist satellites return to the idle state.