As so many have said, this is such an obvious feature that many people (including me) never thought to check for it.  

I can explain how much you're not getting this by refering to your reply below.  These two items:

     use a shared account to access via multiple devices

     turn on 2FA (two factor authentication)

This tells me everythiing I need to know about this.  Not only are you not getting this, you (collectively the entire company?) are not thiinking about this is in a logical way (for 4 years?!? - really?).  How can two different people share an account on different devices if you've turned on 2FA?  Are they supposed to be sure to be in the same room?  Or, do they need to call each other when they try to log in?  Think about it.

Along with others, I have been fairly impressed with your devices but am planning to replace the important ones in my house with another brand that has this *very* basic feature.

 

Sadly, thanks.

 

 

Solla-topee wrote

Hello everyone,

Thank you for the feedback with Kasa Device sharing feature.  

Kasa APP allows logging in TP-Link account on multiple phones, if a second mobile device need to manage your smart device,  try to log in admin account using same email address and password on that second device. 

When you share the account with your friends, family members or anyone else, it is recommended to enable Two-step authentication feature (2FA) in this way, you can see what mobile device has logged in your account, or even force log out a device by removing it from the Trusted Device list.

 

If you wish to share a device with others, in an office etc., you may create a new TP-Link ID to manage that particular device together or use the physical button to control your smart device.

Your suggestion here for device sharing among different account  will be record regularly and forwarded to the appropriate team for consideration. 

 

If you request the same feature,  feel free to share more detailed usage scenario like who you'd like to share your account with or whether using the same account will work for you etc., Those  will help us understand better of your request and set priority when this topic being raised with the Product team. 

 Thank you!

 

More Articles:

• Summary of most Popular Feature Requests for Kasa

• Introducing Tapo SubG Family-Smart Sensors, Smart Switches, Smart Buttons, and More on the Way

  @Solla-topee 

There needs to be a guest account. With the ability to set a time period on access.

Please fix this.

  @CrystiLei 

 

I'd love this as a feature - but with permissions. 

 

Example

• Admin: Can do everything, including factory reset and adjust minimum dimmer settings and other configurations. + All the features below
• Manager: Can control the device, manage smart actions, schedules, and invite other users to use the app
• User: Can control the device within the parameters of what the Admin + Manager users have configured. They can turn on and off the device, adjust the dimmer, or run scenes or actions provided by the Admin + Manager users. 

 

The current method would allow my kid to wipe out any switch they want if I give them access to the app. 

Much needed!

It is vital that TP-Link support the concepts of multiple locations and multiple users, each user having his/her own level of privilege and access to different devices. We have 5 buildings on our farm using Kasa devices, and we should NOT have to give master account control to the dozen or so people who need to use these devices in various buildings.

  @M.L. 
yes, use Wyze products or just about any other smart product and you will have this ability. I like theee and have quite a few of their devices but this is a deal breaker for me.  I have moved many away and will continue to do so unfortunately 

 

As a software and UI/UX developer for over 40 years, I can emphasize this is simply unacceptable.

 

And to point out what others have said, it appears Kasa/TP-Link as a company has software skill issues in general -- case in point, when I was prompted for a "screen name" I ended up with this rejection situation:

Screen Name

[kai_b                                                                                    ]

Screen name must be 3-15 characters, including letters (case sensitive), numbers, hyphens (-) and underscores (_).

 

Let's see: 5 characters is between 3-15 inclusive; and those characters all fall into letters, numbers, hyphens, and underscores.

Yet this perfectly acceptable screen name was rejected as not fitting the required template. Seriously? This is high-school level web dev 101.

 

[TL;DR] As for a solution: I am voting with my money. I have 3 Kasa cameras I am throwing away and replacing with Wyze cameras, because I have already shared access to that single camera -- not my entire Wyze account -- for the very reason you would want to do this.

 

Why, Kasa/TP-Link, is this very basic, minimal capability so difficult to understand? You continue to question the validity of the very concept; you need use cases? fine:

 

1) I want someone to be able to use the camera, check in on my property, when I am not there and unable to do so remotely. In case you didn't know this, it just so happens that internet connectivity does not exist everywhere, and I don't want this person to have access to all the other devices -- just the live video stream of a couple cameras.

 

2) I have a camera in the dog/baby/etc area, and want to let grandparents, aunts/uncles, etc. watch the dog/child/etc *without* giving them (burdening them with) access and control to dozens of smart devices in my master account. Many of these people are not "tech savvy" and would just barely be able to launch an app on their phone and click on the first item visible, but they sure would like to watch Jr and Sis playing -- while they sit in their easy chairs in their own homes.

 

3) I have a company/church/school and need multiple people to be able to monitor the premises during off hours, and *absolutely* do not want them having access to any other devices in the account.

 

4) I have a daycare/petcare facility and want parents/owners to be able to check in on their child/pet at their convenience, and *absolutely* do not want them having access to any other devices in the account. In this case, I may also have some cameras/devices that I want accessible to other staff, but not outsiders, and I still don't want staff to have "full" control of everything.

 

Using your "solution" *I* would have to have 3 or more accounts in order to control all my devices -- and it would be most painful for me to access those very devices I want shared. From a "value" perspective, it is not acceptable for *me* as the owner of the devices to need multiple accounts. I should be able to have someone create an account, then me be able to "share" the device to their account, and have them accept access and be able to see the camera output, but not be able to change anything about the camera settings or remove it from the account. This is how it *should* work, and this is how it *does* work with other companies.

 

The solution, sadly, is to swap out *all* Kasa/TP-Link devices that need to be shared and replace them with products from companies that are already in the 21st century and provide this capability as a simple matter of course.

 

Just like my smart locks: there is a Master account with full access, then there are User accounts which have limited capabilities, and finally there are Guest/Visitor accounts which have the ability to use a temporary code to enter through the entrance protected by that single lock, but whose access is of limited duration and wouldn't allow them to even know about the existence of other locks. A huge part of security is not 2FA or MFA, but simply not even knowing there is an attack surface at all!

 

It would be *nice* if Kasa/TP-Link provided this more reasonable type of solution (i.e., guest accounts with limited access to devices with possible time restrictions -- whether "only between 6p and 7a" or "only for the next week") but simply providing the absolute minimum would be supporting guest accounts for shared devices.

 

And guess what? I've already had people who never before considered smart devices ask me about the Wyze cameras because of the convenience -- they can have someone watch their dog while they're out of town, without providing the "keys to the kingdom" from the whole account. So Kasa/TP-Link -- not only is it the right thing to do, just look at is as cheap marketing!

I am watching this topic with the hope that one day this will be fixed but besides more and more complaints I see nothing. I am also checking for app updates with the same hope of new features such this one but it seems it is in vain.

 

The thing is that I love Kasa cameras for several reasons:

- I already own 5 of them... huh

- they are really stable

- they are reasonably priced

- they offer free cloud storage of the ltest few hours events

- they offer good price for longer cloud storage

- they offer a surprisingly good image, even for the older models

- they integrate the best with Google Home / Google Assistant, I can watch them on Google displays / Chromecast devices with cristal clear picture and minimum lag (about 2 seconds), at least in Europe where I am living; by far the best Google Assistant integration for a third party device. For instance, Tapo, which is also Tp-Link, offers a miserable low resolution when streamed on Google displays / Chromecast devices and this when it is not giving you the message "stream unavailable".

 

But it seems you can not have everything in life at the same time...

4ndrw wrote

That is a massive oversight

I agree