I was running a test and I've noticed that the Hubitat hub will not finish starting up if there is no internet. Then once it boots up I can disconnect the internet from the router to the modem and everything will still work as it should but making the board rely on internet to boot up is not a great idea. I will sit on 65% completed on boot up process forever.
Please advise.
I bet it’s because of the NTP service not being available. If you have an Asus router see this post from @ogiewon about a new feature of Asus Merlin where it can be your local NTP server:
I would suggest opening a support ticket too. Please post back here if you figure it out.
Where am I suppose to set up the NTP server feature?
I have a Motorola router from Spectrum (my ISP) but I am getting tomorrow a Ubiquiti Security Gateway which is going to replace that piece of junk, I'll keep you posted.
You need to see if your router has an NTP server feature (not too many do without 3rd party firmware like ASUSWrt). Otherwise, you need to set one up on your network some other way. You then need to be able to redirect all network NTP traffic to that new local NTP server.
Can the Hubitat Hub just use it's own date and time form the last time it was able to reach an NTP server and continue to booting process or the data and time are not stored in the hub at all and lost on reboot?
I do not believe the hub has an on-board battery backed up clock module. Therefore, it must receive an NTP time server response, or get its clock set via the browser.
I use my Asus RT-AC86U router running the latest AsusWRT Merlin firmware and it happily acts as an NTP time server for all devices on my network (even if they try to connect to an outside NTP time server!) However, the router needs to get its time from the Internet as well! 
Just flagging your post, because I am looking to get one of these as well and would be very interested to see how you make out.
I just got my UniFi Security Gateway 3P but I have to check in the settings if it supports NTP, I hope it does, Otherwise the Hubitat Hub is relying on the internet which is a deal breaker for running totally local off the grid if needed.
Good that there are other options for you to choose from. 
Yes, the Gateway supports NTP. I am using 129.6.15.29 and 129.6.15.28. What do I do next for the Hubitat Hub to hit that ip Address instead?
You can’t tell Hubitat to use your Ubiquity NTP Server. You have to look and see if your router has an option to Intercept and handle all NTP traffic. That’s the cool feature that Merlin recently added to his firmware for ASUS routers.
Would need to port forward/redirect any outbound NTP (tcp/udp 123) to the internal IP you want.
I do something similar with all DNS traffic, but not on a USG - even though I'm a UniFi switch/AP guy I hated the USG and threw it in the trash (literally).
Unless something has changed recently I'm not aware of, you should be able to boot the hub on a network without internet. Just need a DHCP server.
You can manually set the time using the settings hub info sync time from browser.
I will test my demo rig on the latest and see if this still works using a cheap Netgear router for DHCP (no internet or NTP)
hi Patrick, keep me posted on your test results.
Took a retail unit, that had already been registered, so I know it works.
Put it on a cheap netgear router and connected my laptop up via a usb to ethernet adapter.
No internet what so ever was connect to the netgear and wifi was turned off on my laptop.
Hub booted right up, had to find the ip in the netgear connected devices tab, but was able to access the hub locally and pair up a few devices.
So nothing has changed, it is still possible to run a hub offline without an internet connection. You will need something to assign it an IP, network sharing via crossover cable on a mac or pc, or a small router to do the dhcp assignment.
The only issue as expected, was the system time was off (I hard unplugged it vs shutdown, shame on me) but I was able to sync time using the settings, hub info, sync browser time...
Crude bench photo to show the quick setup...
Thanks for the feedback Patrick, maybe something else is wrong in my system which doesn't allow Hubitat to boot up when there is no internet. I'll continue my research.
Download the Hubitat app
