Virtual Lifeguard

An extra pair of eyes on the pool

Never stops watching. Never gets distracted.

Set an old phone on a tripod, tap the water once, and Virtual Lifeguard watches every swimmer for you — speaking up the moment someone's movement stops looking like swimming.

  • Free app
  • No extra hardware
  • Works offline
  • Nothing leaves your phone
See what it does Get it when it's ready
The Virtual Lifeguard app watching a pool. Each swimmer is outlined by a green box, and the edge of the water is traced in cyan.

Every swimmer, tracked at once, on an ordinary phone.

Why it matters

Drowning is silent, and it is fast

It almost never looks like the movies. There is no splashing and no shouting — which is exactly why it is so often missed by someone sitting right there. Nobody can stare at water for an hour without their attention drifting. That is biology, not carelessness.

#1 Cause of death for children ages 1–4 in the US1
88% Of those happen with an adult present1
20 min Is roughly how long careful attention lasts before it starts to fade2
A side-by-side illustration. On the left, labelled Human Vision, an adult looks down at their phone while children play in the pool. On the right, labelled AI Vision, a phone on a tripod watches the same pool with every swimmer outlined.

A moment's glance away is all it takes. Illustration — an AI-generated concept, not a real screenshot.

What it does

Three taps, and it takes the watch

No installation, no plumbing, no cameras bolted to a wall. If you have a spare phone in a drawer, you already have everything you need.

1 · Point it at the water

Prop the phone anywhere it can see the pool. Tap the water once so it knows where to look, and press Start.

2 · It watches everyone

It follows every swimmer at the same time, all of them, continuously — and it pays exactly as much attention in the second hour as in the first.

3 · It speaks up

If someone's movement stops looking like swimming, or they go under and don't come back, the phone sounds a loud alarm and tells you to check the pool.

Private by design

A camera pointed at your children should never send video anywhere, so ours can't. Everything happens on the phone itself. Nothing is recorded, nothing is uploaded, and there is no account, no subscription and no cloud — the app doesn't even ask for internet access.

The app

Built to be understood in one glance

When an alarm matters, it has to be unmistakable — and it has to tell you what to do next.

The app raising an alert: a large red panel reads Possible Submersion, Check the pool now, with a Dismiss button.
An alert says plainly what it saw and what to do — then asks you to look for yourself.
The app's home screen, with a large Start Monitoring button, links to Settings and Data Privacy, and a notice headed Assistive technology.
One button to begin.
The Settings screen, with a detection sensitivity slider, a high-decibel alarm switch, and display options.
You choose how sensitive it is, and how loudly it tells you.

It helps you watch. It never replaces you.

Virtual Lifeguard is assistive technology, and an adult still has to be watching the pool. Think of it as a second pair of eyes that never blinks — not a lifeguard, and not a reason to look away. The app says so on its own home screen, and repeats it with every alert.

Where we are

It works — and it isn't finished

Virtual Lifeguard is a working app built by two students, and it is not yet available to download. Before we put it in anyone's hands we are testing it at real poolsides and settling the licensing behind it, because a safety app you can't trust is worse than none at all.

We would rather be late than be wrong about this. When a beta opens, it will be announced here first.