A light, comfortable smart collar for cats and dogs, being built right now. Know where they are. Know when something changes.
We’ll be in touch as the first collars get close. Thank you for backing this early.
Any questions or feedback? Reach us at info@rubapet.com — we read everything.
Our trails, our hazards, our load-shedding, our vets — and a team you can actually get hold of. Keep scrolling.
Where they are, right now.
If your pet takes a serious knock.
How much they moved and rested.
Tells you when something changes.
Ruba answers both. Check in on your pet whenever you want to, and get told when something changes — whether that’s a shift in their usual patterns or a serious impact.
Live location, movement history and safe zones you draw around home, the park or a friend’s yard. Cross a boundary and your phone knows before you do. If they go missing, Rescue Mode drops battery saving and tracks as hard as it can.
Ruba watches activity, sleep and resting trends in the background and learns what normal looks like for your pet specifically. You hear from it when that pattern shifts — or if there’s a significant impact and they stop moving.
Impact alerts
A car accident. A bad fall on the trail. A serious knock in the yard while you’re at work. The kind of thing you would want to know about immediately. If Ruba detects a significant impact followed by unusual stillness, it can alert you within minutes, with the spot on the map.
Most knocks are nothing, and Ruba stays quiet for those. It’s an impact followed by stillness that matters, and that’s what Ruba is watching for.
MiloTuesday afternoonMilo has been unusually still since.
Activity & sleep
Every step, every nap, every restless hour. Ruba logs movement all day and turns it into one clear picture. Changes in activity, sleep, movement or resting patterns can be early signals that something has changed — often before you would notice it by eye.
Sleep matters as much as steps. Ruba separates genuine rest from lying-down-but-awake, tracks how broken the night was, and flags the weeks where your pet stopped settling properly.
Ruba Energy
Movement drains it. Sleep puts it back. Ruba Energy watches both and turns them into one number your pet can’t tell you themselves — whether they’re up for the long walk or need a quiet afternoon.
The useful part isn’t today’s score. It’s the week where they keep waking up at 60 instead of 80, on the same amount of exercise. That’s the change you’d never spot by eye, and it’s the one worth asking a vet about.
MiloRuba EnergyRecharged well overnight. Good day for a long walk.
The Ruba Map
A snake on the path. Broken glass at the park gate. A dog that goes for other dogs. Ruba members drop a pin the moment they see it, and everyone walking nearby gets the warning before they walk into it. The more of us there are, the safer the routes get.
Ruba Intelligence
Ruba learns your pet’s normal patterns — how much they move, how they sleep, how they breathe at rest — and highlights the changes that matter. Ruba doesn’t diagnose your pet. It learns what’s normal for them, and lets you know when something changes. Open the app and you get one line. If your pet doesn’t need you, it says so and you get on with your day.
MiloTuesday, at homeEverything is within his typical pattern.
In the app or on WhatsApp, in words you can act on.
Milo is home and settled in the garden.
Milo left the safe zone two minutes ago. Tap to follow him live.
A significant impact was detected near Main Road, and Milo has been unusually still since. Tap to see where he is.
Milo has slept in shorter stretches than usual for four nights running. Worth mentioning to your vet.
Quiet day, good sleep. Milo is feeling like himself.
Light enough for a cat, tough enough for a hiking dog. The hardest constraint we set ourselves was comfort — if a pet notices it, we got it wrong.
We’re building the first collars now, so a few details may still change along the way. The waitlist always hears first. Ruba provides wellness and behavioural insights and is not a medical or diagnostic device.
How it works
Ruba doesn’t rely on your phone being nearby. Here’s how it works, and why it needs a plan.
Reports your pet’s position from anywhere with mobile signal. It doesn’t need your phone nearby.
The SIM needs airtime every month, the location data needs servers, and the app needs somewhere to live.
Magnetic charger in the box. No batteries to buy, replace or throw away.
Read through the collar they already wear. No shaving, no chest strap, no clips.
We’re building Ruba right now, so nothing is on sale yet. These are the launch prices, and the waitlist gets them locked in when the first collars are ready.
Everything you need to find them.
Everything you need to look after them.
Or R1,900 a year.
Think of it like a phone. The handset is yours the moment you buy it, and the airtime is what keeps it useful. Ruba is the same — you need both, and here is exactly what each one pays for.
A GPS receiver, a cellular radio, motion and optical sensors, a rechargeable battery, a water-resistant enclosure, the reflective collar and the magnetic charger. Paid once and yours to keep. There is nothing else to buy, ever.
Airtime for the SIM inside the collar, the servers holding your pet’s location and history, Ruba Intelligence learning what normal looks like for them, the app, the Ruba Map and our support team. Without a plan, the collar cannot reach you.
Ruba is named after Rubi, my cat, who disappeared without a trace.
There was no location history. No last known position. No way of knowing what had happened to her. I started Ruba so that no owner has to sit with that silence — and so that when something changes with a pet, somebody notices early enough to act on it.
Damian — founder, Ruba
We’re building the first collars now and we’re targeting a launch in H2 2027. Hardware moves, so we’ll tell you honestly if that shifts — and the waitlist always hears first.
Nothing now. Joining the waitlist is free and commits you to nothing — you’re simply telling us you’re interested. When we go live you’ll be able to order directly from our store, and the waitlist is how you’ll know the moment that happens. You’ll pay for the collar once, then a monthly plan to keep it connected — at the founding price we’ve held for you.
The collar has its own SIM card, and that SIM needs airtime every month to send you your pet’s location from anywhere. But the plan is buying you far more than a signal. It’s Ruba Intelligence learning what normal looks like for your pet and telling you the moment it changes. It’s impact alerts, safe zones and Rescue Mode. It’s Ruba Energy, activity and sleep, the Ruba Map, and every feature we add after launch — at no extra cost. Think of it like a phone: the handset is yours, and the plan is what makes it worth having.
Your subscription is what keeps the collar connected, so if it lapses the tracking, alerts and Ruba Intelligence stop. There’s no airtime to send them with. The collar itself is still yours — a good reflective collar with a QR identity tag on it — and your pet’s history stays safe in your account. Restart a plan whenever you like and everything picks up where it left off.
Ruba is designed for cats and dogs, with an adjustable strap. Final minimum size and weight requirements will be confirmed during development, and keeping it light enough for smaller animals is the part we’re working hardest on.
Anywhere with mobile coverage. Ruba uses GPS to find your pet and the mobile network to tell you, so it isn’t limited by how far your phone can reach. We’re launching in South Africa first.
We email you about Ruba and nothing else. We don’t sell or share your details, and you can ask us to delete them at any time. The full detail is in our privacy policy.
Still wondering about something? Email us at info@rubapet.com and we’ll get back to you.
Nothing to pay today. When the first collars are ready, the waitlist gets first option, at founding pricing.