A method for determining whether an electronic device is located on a stationary surface includes generating, by a first motion sensor of an electronic device, first sensor data over an acquisition time window. The method includes determining, by a first feature detection circuit of the electronic device, at least one first orientation-independent feature for the acquisition time window based on the first sensor data. The method further includes executing, by a first classifying circuit of the electronic device, a first machine learning classification to determine whether the electronic device is steady or is in motion. And the method further includes, in response to determining the electronic device is steady, executing, by a second classifying circuit of the electronic device, a second machine learning classification to determine whether the electronic device is on a stationary surface or is on a semi-stationary surface based on the at least one first orientation-independent feature.