Get ahead of your glucose.

If you live with Type 1 and wear a Dexcom G7: install AheadBLE first, then Ahead.

If you’re a parent, partner or friend following someone: install Ahead Lite. They share their stream with you. You never need AheadBLE or Ahead on a follower’s phone.

The person with Type 1 has the main account. They sign up in Ahead with their own email, and that account holds their glucose. Ahead should always be signed in with their account — it’s the source everything else follows.

Everyone who follows gets their own companion account. Each family member or caregiver installs Ahead Lite on their own phone and signs up there with their own email — one Lite account per person, per device. They verify their email, then the person with Type 1 shares with them from Menu → Account → Manage Sharing.

One Lite account can follow several people. A parent with two kids, for example, has one Lite account and both kids share with it. But Ahead itself is only ever for the person living with Type 1 — don’t sign into Ahead with a family member’s account to watch someone; that’s what Ahead Lite is for.

AheadBLE has no account at all. It only connects your sensor to your phone.

Ahead is an early beta built by one person, and it isn’t on the Play Store yet. Sharing the APK directly gets fixes to people quickly. The trade-off is that Android asks you to allow installs from your browser and Play Protect may warn you — which is why every file has a published fingerprint.

Only install APKs from this page, and check the file with the fingerprint checker first. If it doesn’t match, delete it. After installing, you can switch “Install unknown apps” back off for your browser. To see exactly what each app asks for, read Permissions.

No — AheadBLE, Ahead and Ahead Lite are all Android-only for now.

Android 9 or newer, and the apps are built for Android 15. AheadBLE and Ahead use Health Connect, which is built into Android 14 and up; on Android 9–13 it’s a free app from Google Play. Ahead Lite doesn’t need it.

AheadBLE (it appears on your phone as Ahead Connect) is a small app with one job: talk to your Dexcom G7 over Bluetooth and hand each reading to Ahead. It saves every reading to Health Connect and also pings Ahead instantly, so alerts don’t wait on a timer. More on AheadBLE.

No. AheadBLE has no sign-in and doesn’t use the internet — it just pairs with your sensor and passes readings to your phone. Your account lives in Ahead. How accounts work.

Ahead needs a live glucose source. It doesn’t connect to the sensor itself — it reads Health Connect. AheadBLE is the app that fills Health Connect from a G7, and it’s the one we build and test Ahead with. Until AheadBLE is installed, connected and showing “Sensor connected :)”, Ahead has nothing to show.

Other apps that write to Health Connect could feed Ahead too, but that route isn’t covered or tested here.

AheadBLE is built for the Dexcom G7. It doesn’t support the G6, FreeStyle Libre or other sensors.

It’s printed on your G7 applicator — check the box too if you can’t spot it. You can type it in or scan the applicator’s barcode with your camera. Keep the applicator handy until you’ve paired.

AheadBLE is built to look after itself so you don’t have to keep opening it:

• It runs as a foreground service (that’s its persistent notification), which is how Android knows to keep it alive.
• If the Bluetooth link drops, it keeps scanning for your sensor — even with the screen off — and reconnects on its own the next time the sensor wakes up (about every 5 minutes).
• After reconnecting it pulls any readings it missed.
• Backup alarms and a start-up receiver restart it after a reboot or an app update.
• If a saved connection goes stale, it forgets it and finds the sensor again instead of getting stuck.
• Its notification is honest: Sensor connected :) when a fresh reading arrived in the last ~12 minutes, Sensor disconnected :( otherwise.

Each G7 has its own pairing code. When you start a new one, open AheadBLE, choose Pair a different sensor (or the one-tap New sensor reset, which clears the old sensor’s details), and enter the new 4-digit code. Ahead itself needs no changes.

That’s untested. We recommend AheadBLE be the only app that connects directly to your sensor. Treat running both as unsupported.

Android 11 and older require the Location permission before an app can scan for Bluetooth devices. AheadBLE uses it only for that scan and never reads where you are. On newer Android versions it asks only for “Nearby devices”.

A normal CGM app tells you what your number is. Ahead also looks at how fast it’s moving and projects 15 and 30 minutes ahead, so it can nudge you before you cross a line. Yellow warnings play a distinct tone; red alerts use vibration and spoken voice. It also has Alarm Thresholds — your own alerts for a value or a rate of change.

Found in Ahead’s menu under Safety → Alarm Thresholds. They’re tripwires you set yourself — “alert me if I climb to this number” or “if I’m falling faster than this rate.” Make one permanent, or “just for today.”

When a threshold is crossed it sends one alert that can sound even through Ahead’s Silence and Do Not Disturb, then goes quiet again unless things get meaningfully worse or it’s crossed again later.

Red alerts and Alarm Thresholds are set up to break through Do Not Disturb once you grant Ahead “Do Not Disturb access”. But Android’s battery management can still delay or stop background apps, so set AheadBLE and Ahead to Unrestricted battery and lock them in Recents. Treat alerts as best-effort, never guaranteed.

Ahead does its analysis and alerting on your phone, so alerts don’t need a connection. You need internet to sign in, sync to your account and share with family. AheadBLE only needs Bluetooth.

No. Ahead Lite is a companion for the people who care about you, not a lighter version for the person with diabetes. It shows their current number, trend, a 15-minute projection and a 3-hour chart, alerts on lows and fast drops, and tells you calmly if their data goes quiet. It never touches Bluetooth or Health Connect.

1. They install Ahead Lite and create an account with their email.
2. They tap the link in the verification email (sharing won’t work until they do).
3. In Ahead you open Menu → Account → Manage Sharing, enter their email and tap Grant access.
4. They open Ahead Lite and pick you from the list.

Yes. Add each person by email in Manage Sharing. Each one needs their own Ahead Lite account on their own phone — see how accounts work.

Yes. One Ahead Lite account can follow several people — for example a parent watching two kids. Each person shares with your email from their own Ahead app, and Ahead Lite lists everyone who has shared with you. Pick who you’re looking at from that list. (If only one person has shared, it opens straight to them.)

Open Manage Sharing in Ahead and remove them from the “Currently shared with” list. Their access ends.

Ahead Lite keeps you signed in for about 30 days. If you haven’t opened it for a month, background updates can start failing and you’ll see a “can’t reach data” style notice. Open the app and sign in again, and make sure the phone is online.

There’s no reset button inside the apps yet. Email hello@aheadt1d.com from the address on your account and we’ll sort it out.

No. Ahead hasn’t been through regulatory review. It’s an independent monitoring tool and research project built by one person. Don’t use it as your only safeguard, and follow your care team’s guidance.

No, never. Ahead flags what your glucose is doing and where it’s heading. Dosing and eating decisions belong to you and your care team.

The Bluetooth link, Health Connect readings and the analysis and alerting all stay on your phone. Ahead also syncs your readings to your Ahead account so trend checks and family sharing work, and family only ever sees you if you add them. See Your data for the full picture.

No. We don’t sell, broker or monetize your glucose records, and we don’t send raw CGM streams to ad networks or analytics brokers. Read the full Privacy Policy.

In Ahead or Ahead Lite go to Menu → Account → Delete account and confirm with your password. That deletes your account and revokes its access. If you’d like confirmation that your stored readings are gone too, email hello@aheadt1d.com.

This one comes from our own daily use on a Samsung phone: locking the app in Recents seems to help it survive everything, without costing much battery.

1. Tap the Recents button — the one to the right of the Home button — to see your open apps.
2. Tap the app’s icon at the top of its card. A small menu with a few options appears.
3. Choose Lock this app (on some versions it reads Keep open).

Do it for AheadBLE (Ahead Connect) and Ahead — and Ahead Lite if you follow someone. A padlock appears on the card, which keeps the app out of the way of the “Close all” button and the phone’s automatic clean-up.

Not every phone has this: Samsung does, and some other brands have a similar “lock” option in Recents. If you don’t see it, don’t worry — the Unrestricted battery setting matters more. Locking is a helper, not a guarantee.

Give it a few minutes first: the G7 only transmits about every 5 minutes, so a reconnect can take a moment. If it’s still disconnected after about 15 minutes:

1. Check Bluetooth is on and the phone is near the sensor.
2. Check AheadBLE’s battery is Unrestricted and that it hasn’t been force-stopped. Locking it in Recents helps too.
3. Open AheadBLE and confirm monitoring is running.
4. Just started a new sensor? Use Pair a different sensor and enter the new code (see switching sensors).

Still stuck? Email hello@aheadt1d.com.

Ahead reads from Health Connect, which AheadBLE fills. So: (1) check AheadBLE shows Sensor connected :); (2) check Ahead still has Health Connect permission to read blood glucose; (3) give it a few minutes — a new reading only arrives about every 5 minutes; (4) if you just started a new sensor, remember the G7’s ~30-minute warm-up.

Almost always Android’s battery management. Check, for each app: notifications are allowed; battery is set to Unrestricted; the app isn’t on any “sleeping apps” or “battery optimization” list (Samsung and some other makers have their own); and, for Ahead, that Do Not Disturb access is granted. Locking the app in Recents can help too.

Download the new APK from this page and open it — Android installs it over the old one and keeps your data, as long as it’s the same app from this page. Check the version on the card and verify the fingerprint.

If Android refuses because the app “conflicts with an existing package”, uninstall the old version first. Your Ahead account and cloud data are safe; you’ll just sign in again.

Long-press the app and choose Uninstall, like any other app. Readings AheadBLE already saved stay in Health Connect until you delete them there.