Send Push Notifications and Trigger Live Activities with PHP

Use the official PHP SDK to deliver immediate Push Notifications and Live Activity progress updates for long-running jobs and automation workflows.

Install

composer require activitysmith/activitysmith

Setup

<?php
use ActivitySmith\ActivitySmith;
use ActivitySmith\LiveActivities;
use ActivitySmith\LiveActivityAction;
use ActivitySmith\LiveActivityAlertBadge;
use ActivitySmith\LiveActivityAlertIcon;
use ActivitySmith\LiveActivityContentState;
use ActivitySmith\LiveActivityMetric;
use ActivitySmith\PushAction;
$activitysmith = new ActivitySmith($_ENV['ACTIVITYSMITH_API_KEY']);

Push Notifications

Send an immediate notification for a completed task or event:

$activitysmith->notifications->send(
    title: 'New subscription 💸',
    message: 'Customer upgraded to Pro plan',
);

Rich Push Notifications with Media

Send images, videos, or audio with your push notifications, press and hold to preview media directly from the notification, then tap through to open the linked content.

Image Preview

$activitysmith->notifications->send(
    title: 'Homepage ready',
    message: 'Your agent finished the redesign.',
    media: 'https://cdn.example.com/output/homepage-v2.png',
    redirection: 'https://github.com/acme/web/pull/482',
);

Audio Preview

What will work

direct image URL: .jpg, .png, .gif, etc.
direct audio file URL: .mp3, .m4a, etc.
direct video file URL: .mp4, .mov, etc.
URL that responds with a proper media Content-Type, even if the path has no extension

media can be combined with redirection, but not with actions.

Push notification redirection and actions are optional. Use them to open HTTPS URLs, run a specific iPhone Shortcut with a shortcuts://run-shortcut?name=... URL, or trigger backend webhook workflows.

Actionable push notification with redirection and actions

$activitysmith->notifications->send(
    title: 'New subscription 💸',
    message: 'Customer upgraded to Pro plan',
    redirection: 'https://crm.example.com/customers/cus_9f3a1d',
    actions: [
        PushAction::make(
            title: 'Open CRM Profile',
            type: 'open_url',
            url: 'https://crm.example.com/customers/cus_9f3a1d',
        ),
        PushAction::make(
            title: 'Chat with Jarvis',
            type: 'open_url',
            url: 'shortcuts://run-shortcut?name=Jarvis',
        ),
        PushAction::make(
            title: 'Start Onboarding Workflow',
            type: 'webhook',
            url: 'https://hooks.example.com/activitysmith/onboarding/start',
            method: 'POST',
            body: [
                'customer_id' => 'cus_9f3a1d',
                'plan' => 'pro',
            ],
        ),
    ],
);

Live Activities

Choose the Live Activity type that matches what you want to show:

Stats

Show up to 8 labeled values on your Lock Screen, from revenue and orders to uptime and conversion.

Metrics

Track two related values with segmented bars, such as CPU and memory.

Segmented Progress

Show progress through a known set of steps, like build, test, deploy, and verify.

Progress

Show percentage progress for jobs that move continuously toward completion.

Alert

Show status updates with a clear message, badge, and icon. When you add an action button, color controls the button tint.

Timer

Count down from a duration, or count up from 00:00 while a job runs.

Start & Update Live Activity

Use a stable streamKey to identify the metric, job, deployment, or system you want to keep visible. The first stream(...) call starts the Live Activity. Later calls with the same streamKey update it.

Stats

$activitysmith->liveActivities->stream(
    'sales-hourly',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Sales',
        subtitle: 'last hour',
        type: 'stats',
        metrics: [
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'Revenue', value: '$2430', color: 'blue'),
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'Orders', value: '37', color: 'green'),
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'Conversion', value: '4.8%', color: 'magenta'),
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'Avg Order', value: '$65.68', color: 'yellow'),
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'Refunds', value: '$84', color: 'red'),
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'New Buyers', value: '18', color: 'cyan'),
        ],
    ),
);

Metrics

$activitysmith->liveActivities->stream(
    'prod-web-1',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Server Health',
        subtitle: 'prod-web-1',
        type: 'metrics',
        metrics: [
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'CPU', value: 9, unit: '%'),
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'MEM', value: 45, unit: '%'),
        ],
    ),
);

Segmented Progress

$activitysmith->liveActivities->stream(
    'nightly-backup',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Nightly Backup',
        subtitle: 'upload archive',
        type: 'segmented_progress',
        numberOfSteps: 3,
        currentStep: 2,
    ),
);

Progress

$activitysmith->liveActivities->stream(
    'search-reindex',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Search Reindex',
        subtitle: 'catalog-v2',
        type: 'progress',
        percentage: 42,
    ),
);

Alert

$activitysmith->liveActivities->stream(
    'customer-ops',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Reactivation',
        message: 'Lumen came back after 2 weeks',
        type: 'alert',
        icon: LiveActivityAlertIcon::make(symbol: 'cloud.sun', color: 'yellow'),
        badge: LiveActivityAlertBadge::make(title: 'Customer', color: 'magenta'),
    ),
);

The icon.symbol value is an Apple SF Symbol name. Browse the catalog with one of these tools:

ActivitySmith app - Open Settings -> SF Symbols to browse 45 hand-picked icons ready to use
SF Symbols - Apple's official macOS app
Interactful - free third-party iOS app listing all SF Symbols under Foundations -> Iconography

Timer

$activitysmith->liveActivities->stream(
    'benchmark-run',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Benchmark Run',
        subtitle: 'sampling',
        type: 'timer',
        durationSeconds: 300,
        color: 'cyan',
    ),
);

For a countdown, send duration_seconds. You can update title, subtitle, color, or any other visible field as the work changes. Leave duration_seconds out unless you want to change the timer.

To start at 00:00 and count up, set counts_down: false and leave out duration_seconds.

End Live Activity

Call endStream(...) with the same streamKey to dismiss the Live Activity. You can include final values before it is removed. By default, iOS removes the Live Activity after two minutes. Set autoDismissMinutes to choose a different dismissal time, including 0 for immediate dismissal.

$activitysmith->liveActivities->endStream(
    'prod-web-1',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Server Health',
        subtitle: 'prod-web-1',
        type: 'metrics',
        metrics: [
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'CPU', value: 7, unit: '%'),
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'MEM', value: 38, unit: '%'),
        ],
        autoDismissMinutes: 2,
    ),
);

Live Activity Action

Live Activities can include one optional action button.

open_url: open an HTTPS URL.
open_url with a shortcuts:// URL: run an Apple Shortcut, for example to open an app.
webhook: trigger a backend GET/POST workflow.

Open URL action

$activitysmith->liveActivities->stream(
    'prod-web-1',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Server Health',
        subtitle: 'prod-web-1',
        type: 'metrics',
        metrics: [
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'CPU', value: 76, unit: '%'),
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'MEM', value: 52, unit: '%'),
        ],
    ),
    action: LiveActivityAction::make(
        title: 'Dashboard',
        type: 'open_url',
        url: 'https://ops.example.com/servers/prod-web-1',
    ),
);

Apple Shortcut action

$activitysmith->liveActivities->stream(
    'deploy-payments-api',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Deploying payments-api',
        subtitle: 'Running database migrations',
        type: 'segmented_progress',
        numberOfSteps: 5,
        currentStep: 3,
    ),
    action: LiveActivityAction::make(
        title: 'Chat with Jarvis',
        type: 'open_url',
        url: 'shortcuts://run-shortcut?name=Jarvis',
    ),
);

Webhook action

$activitysmith->liveActivities->stream(
    'search-reindex',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Reindexing product search',
        subtitle: 'Shard 7 of 12',
        type: 'segmented_progress',
        numberOfSteps: 12,
        currentStep: 7,
    ),
    action: LiveActivityAction::make(
        title: 'Pause Reindex',
        type: 'webhook',
        url: 'https://ops.example.com/hooks/search/reindex/pause',
        method: 'POST',
        body: [
            'job_id' => 'reindex-2026-03-19',
            'requested_by' => 'activitysmith-php',
        ],
    ),
);

Icons and Badges

Add more context to Live Activities with icons and badges.

Icon

Supported Live Activity types: stats, metrics, progress, segmented_progress, and alert.

$activitysmith->liveActivities->stream(
    'prod-web-1',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Server Health',
        subtitle: 'prod-web-1',
        type: LiveActivities::TYPE_METRICS,
        icon: LiveActivityAlertIcon::make(symbol: 'server.rack', color: 'blue'),
        metrics: [
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'CPU', value: 18, unit: '%'),
            LiveActivityMetric::make(label: 'MEM', value: 42, unit: '%'),
        ],
    ),
);

The icon.symbol value is an Apple SF Symbol name. Browse the catalog with one of these tools:

ActivitySmith app - Open Settings -> SF Symbols to browse 45 hand-picked icons ready to use
SF Symbols - Apple's official macOS app
Interactful - free third-party iOS app listing all SF Symbols under Foundations -> Iconography

Badge

Badges are supported by alert, progress, and segmented_progress Live Activities.

$activitysmith->liveActivities->stream(
    'nightly-database-backup',
    contentState: LiveActivityContentState::make(
        title: 'Nightly Database Backup',
        subtitle: 'verify restore',
        type: LiveActivities::TYPE_PROGRESS,
        badge: LiveActivityAlertBadge::make(title: 'S3', color: 'cyan'),
        percentage: 62,
    ),
);

Live Activity Colors

Choose from these colors for the Live Activity accent, including progress bars and action buttons, or apply them to an individual icon or badge:

lime

green

cyan

blue

purple

magenta

red

orange

yellow

gray

Widgets

ActivitySmith lets you display any value on your Lock Screen with widgets - SaaS metrics, revenue, number of users, uptime, or anything else you want to track. Create a metric in the web app, then update the metric value using our API, add a widget to your lock screen and it will fetch the latest update automatically.

$activitysmith->metrics->update('deploy.success_rate', 99.9);

String metric values work too.

$activitysmith->metrics->update('prod.status', 'healthy');

Integrate with any PHP application

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Send Push Notifications and Trigger Live Activities with PHP

PACKAGE

REPOSITORY

DOCUMENTATION

Image Preview

Audio Preview

What will work

Stats

Metrics

Segmented Progress

Progress

Alert

Timer

Open URL action

Apple Shortcut action

Webhook action

Icon

Badge

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