Lake Travis, right on your phone
A small card on your phone's Home Screen that always shows today's lake level — no app to open, nothing to check. It looks like this, with live numbers:
Setting it up takes about three minutes, costs nothing, and needs no account. These steps are for iPhone — using Android? tap here.
Get the free app called “Scriptable”
Scriptable is a free, well-known app from the App Store that lets your phone show custom cards like this one. No sign-up, no payment, no ads.
Open the App Store ↗Tap Get, wait for it to install, then come back here. (Don't open Scriptable yet.)
Copy the widget code
This button copies everything the widget needs — already set up for Lake Travis. One tap, nothing to type:
Open Scriptable and tap the + sign
Open the Scriptable app you just installed. In the top-right corner, tap the + sign. A blank page appears.
Paste the code
Press and hold your finger on the blank page for a second, until a small menu pops up. Tap Paste. The page fills with text — you don't need to read or understand any of it.
Tap “Done”
Tap Done in the top-left corner. That's the app part finished — now we put the card on your Home Screen.
Make your Home Screen apps wiggle
Go to your Home Screen (where all your apps are). Press and hold your finger on an empty spot between apps until everything starts to wiggle.
Add a Scriptable widget
While things are wiggling, tap Edit in the top-left corner, then Add Widget. (On older iPhones it's a + sign instead.)
In the search box, type Scriptable and tap it. Swipe once to the wider, middle size — it fits the most information — then tap Add Widget.
Point the widget at the lake
A dark square appears on your Home Screen. While everything is still wiggling, tap that square once. A small settings menu opens.
Tap Script, then choose the one you created (it's the only one, probably called Untitled Script). Tap anywhere outside the menu, then tap Done in the top-right corner.
That's it 🎉
Within a minute the card fills in with today's level, and from then on it quietly updates itself every 15–30 minutes. The small “as of” line at the bottom always shows how fresh the reading is. Tap the card any time to open the full dashboard.
If something looks off
- The card says “Select script in configuration.”
- Step 8 didn't stick. Make the apps wiggle again, tap the card once, tap Script, and choose your script.
- The numbers seem old.
- iPhones update widgets on their own schedule, usually every 15–30 minutes — and the lake gauge itself reports every 15 minutes. Check the “as of” time on the card; that's when the reading was taken.
- It says “offline” in the corner.
- Your phone couldn't reach the internet just then, so the card is showing the last reading it saved. It fixes itself on the next update.
- Want a different lake?
- Each lake's site has its own copy button — visit that lake's site, open its Widget page, and repeat from step 2 into a new script.
On Android?
This particular widget is iPhone-only for now. The next best thing takes 15 seconds: open www.hydrowet.com in Chrome, tap the ⋮ menu in the top-right corner, and choose Add to Home screen. You'll get a one-tap icon that opens the live dashboard.
Free and personal-use, like the rest of the site. Levels come from public agency gauges and are provisional. Questions? contact@handhewn.works