How I Use Home Assistant in 2025
292 comments
·January 24, 2025balloob
doctoboggan
Hi Balloob, great project, thanks for all your work! I've been using it for over 10 years now.
I am wondering if you've ever considered a change to your release rules. Monthly releases are great, but having breaking changes in every release can get to be a bit of a burden. I think it would make end users lives easier if you were able to limit breaking changes to only once (or twice) per year.
I try to read the breaking changes list every time, but sometimes I don't mess with HA for a few months as it's all running smoothly. Then when I do log back in I have a large backlog of breaking changes to review. Usually at this point I just don't upgrade and the problem keeps getting worse. If instead I knew that certain upgrades do no include breaking changes I could more easily keep up to date, and only look more closely at the yearly (or bi-yearly) update that includes the breaking changes.
balloob
We've actively managing our backwards incompatible changes, but sometimes it's out of our control (ie an API change). For things we deprecate in Home Assistant, it is a minimum of 6 months period where we print warnings with alternatives. Integrations set up via the UI, will only change for improvement if we can ensure there is a migration path (sometimes requiring adding some extra info).
Some backwards incompatible changes like requiring a new Z-Wave JS version are also able to be managed automatically by Home Assistant. However, because of choice, there are many ways Home Assistant can be installed and we're not always responsible for the installation.
I believe that we can do better in knowing what integrations you use, and mapping that against the integrations that require changes.
Rooster61
First, thank you. Home Assistant is an outstanding example of having control of our electronics rather than giving money to data harvesting companies.
Second, I'm curious, how often do you guys have to deal with negative actions taken towards you by those same data harvesting giants? I'd imagine they aren't huge fans of this technology. Any Cease and Desist or other fun examples you guys have had to defend yourselves from?
balloob
We have very good relationships across the industry, especially the bigger companies. I literally just came back from a meeting with Google Home :)
Where we see the most pushback is from industries adjacent to the smart home, as they don't appreciate the openness. Think garage doors, cars, or cloud data providers for info that can be useful in the home.
When someone complains, like Mazda [1], we pull their integration and communicate their stance to our shared users, and people considering buying into their products. We don't fight for access, as a manufacturer with a cloud service will always be able to find a way. If it is a local device though, our community tends to find a way[2]
[1]: https://arstechnica.com/cars/2023/10/mazdas-dmca-takedown-ki... [2]: https://www.home-assistant.io/blog/2023/11/06/removal-of-myq...
adamtaylor_13
It’s interesting how some of these actions backfire. I will literally never purchase a chamberlain product ever again because of how overtly money-grabbing they are.
I suppose in some ways, it’s a good thing. It shows me what companies I should support, and which I shouldn’t.
null
roger_
Organizing devices and creating automations is still very tedious.
I'd love to be able to add a device and describe it (where it is, what it does, etc.) and have HA automatically integrate it with existing automations or fuse it with other sensors. Maybe leveraging LLMs for this.
e.g.:
I buy a new leak sensor and add it to HA. I should just tell HA it's a leak sensor and it's in my laundry room and have it create an automation to send alerts, etc. when there's a leak.
Or I add a temperature sensor in my living room and have it automatically be fused with other sensors to update my living room average temperate.
balloob
You're right. Home Assistant is the best toolbox out there, but people need to build things themselves. That's something we plan to tackle, but no timeline. Leak sensors, smoke detectors, CO2 sensors, garage door openers, they can all have benefit from some built-in automations to warn when a problem is detected.
bravoetch
Add to HA, and set 'area' or 'label' to the same as all your other leak sensors. Use the area or label in your automation.
I find HA joyously easy to use. I have my garage door, lights all around the house, thermostats, hot water recirculation system, doorbell, lutron blinds, and ceiling fans. The automations are easy to make, and have been getting easier over the last few years with HA improvements. (and same as others in this discussion, I use zigbee smart switches. The GE brand ones are great).
roger_
I don't think you can trigger by a label/area and also retrieve which device was the trigger (groups had that issue).
Helmut10001
One trick: Add your automations.yml (and ideally, all HASS config/ymls) to a git repository, so you can track changes, organize and observe how automation changes behave.
bloqs
What brand of smart lightbulbs do you use? Thanks for all your hard work!
balloob
Like the other commenter said, smart switches are the way to go. I prefer the Shelly modules behind light switches. They are tiny, affordable and their new generation does Zigbee/Wifi/Matter/Bluetooth, so always something that suits your installation.
bloqs
Thanks for the reply. I saw on reddit there are a worrying amount of reports (and photos) of Shelley relays catching fire....!
Perhaps have a look! Thanks for all your work again, I love HA
nicholasjarnold
Agree with your Shelly-behind-the-switch model. My one hesitation going all-in with them has been perhaps reaching an eventual state of "too much 2.4Ghz WiFi traffic on a narrow IoT-specific WiFi network", but I suppose that's easily solvable by buying another AP. Currently I'm happily running a few of them behind the wall plate in my switches (check the space in your switch box first!)...no issues after many many months of continuous operation. Didn't know about the new gen supporting Matter, that's great.
Also, I too wanted to extend to you a really big THANK YOU from a very happy member of the HASS community. I came over from OpenHAB a handful of years ago and I couldn't be happier. Please keep up the good work! Good luck with all the hardware sales and Nabu Casa stuff!
edit: clarified that I used to run OpenHAB
vladgur
I totally missed Shelly becoming an HA Darling - I have an older home with some of the wiring not having a Neutral wire, so Lutron Casetta has been my only option and those No-neutral dimmers are extremely expensive.
Will look into Shelly
from-nibly
I use smart lights with smart switches in detached mode and they are not resilient to ha going down. I wish I could get smart bulb functionality (dimming, color change) with smart switches being the physical driver of them being on/off.
luma
Not the fella you asked but let me offer some wisdom: smart switches are a lot easier to live with than smart lights. If you also want color control, HA can do a decent job of making smart switches work well with smart lights.
The core problem with a smart light is that it very likely has a switch somewhere. If someone turns that switch off, that smart light just lost power and became dumb. Turning it back on now involves a trip to the switch.
A smart switch is smart so long as utility power is running and you never find yourself in a position where the managed device is in an unknown and/or uncontrollable state.
giobox
Even better, get smart switches that don't use wifi or IP addresses. I'm personally of opinion my homes core features should not rely on needing IP addresses, working DHCP or DNS etc just to turn a light bulb on and off.
Home assistant works amazingly well with zigbee devices, and these are plentiful and cheap etc, and don't rely on working wifi/IP infrastructure. When I sell up, my zigbee switches will work just fine as plain-ole light switches even with all my Home Assistant infra ripped out, leaving no issues for next buyer.
You can add zigbee support to pretty much any Home Assistant setup with a 20 buck USB adapter, Home Assistant even make an official one:
https://www.home-assistant.io/connectzbt1/
The also sell Home Assistant servers with zigbee radios built in:
https://www.home-assistant.io/yellow/
The light switches are often cheaper than wifi equivalents too. Wifi bulbs should really only be considered by renters IMO - people who can't easily replace wall switches or similar.
wkat4242
The problem with smart switches is they require 3 wires: live, neutral and the switched wire to the light. Where I live most switches have only two: live and the switched wire to the light. The neutral goes directly to the light and doesn't pass through the switch. Because of this I have no way to power the smart switch module. Unless I want to rewire half the house :(
hokumguru
My solution was to add Shelly relays behind all of my “dumb” switches. They keep power always on and essentially turn the switch into a smart button to dim or brighten my Lifx lights. This way I get circadian & party lighting while still maintaining the convenience of physical light switches!
And to parent question: Lifx still has the best color/brightness of any smart bulb and they’re IMO the best. Just make sure your WiFi can handle it.
BrutalCoding
Disagreed. To get the best of both worlds I run smart switches that control the smart lights. E.g. install the Philips Hue Wall Switch Module (Zigbee) and make an automation in HomeAssistant to turn off the corresponding light(s).
Now you benefit from both, like being able to make the lights fade off/on.
Also, in case it doesn’t always respond instantly, you should be able to bind the Zigbee devices directly to each other so that it doesn’t need to travel to the Zigbee coordinator (or mesh?) first. Haven’t had the need for this myself though.
diffeomorphism
Can you do that yourself or would you need an electrician to sign off? What about your landlord?
I agree in principle that this is much nicer in theory. Just like wired is more reliable than wireless. However, retrofitting all that is also much more difficult.
Semaphor
Smart switches are a lot more annoying when renting, though. In addition, for us, all but the hallway bulbs make frequent use of color features, so I’d need both anyway.
Though I’ll admit, it might be worth the hassle if you have guests often or many people living at your place.
sroussey
I have Lutron switches. What ceiling lights can I get that change color based on time of day?
BikiniPrince
This is my next adventure because somewhere someone had left a light on! Those esp32 relays can fit right in a work box.
null
Carrok
Are there any plans to add automations based on People and Areas (not zones)? I found the cool project Bermuda[0] and it triggers person entered/left area events based on bluetooth devices. This works great in my testing with a phone being tracked by Shelly switches. But I can't seem to find a way to actually make these events do anything. It would be even better if I didn't have to set up area specific automations at all and just be able to say "turn on the lights in an area to 20% if someone enters it after sunset".
Thanks for all your great work!
balloob
Not from our side. You can see our roadmap here; https://www.home-assistant.io/blog/2024/11/15/roadmap-2024h2...
Now the community should be able to create such things, as our automation engine is very powerful.
I think the challenge in general with room presence detection is that these systems are not very common/reliable yet for us to aim to standardize.
baq
Check out espresense
ulrischa
The old automation in YAML is very cluncky as the author also mentioned. The new UI guided creation is not powerful and can become confusing for complex cases on the other side. I do all my automation with the node-red Integration. But the combination of the node-red flows with the Homeassistant dashboards is not very good. Do you plan to change the automation to something like node-red but better integrated? Or change the yaml to sonething less declarative and more code centric?
mvip
@balloob -- author of post here. Would love to have you on my podcast to nerd out about Home Assistant (https://vpetersson.com/podcast/).
FloatArtifact
> Founder of Home Assistant here. Let me know if anyone has any questions about the project or the Open Home Foundation (which now owns Home Assistant, ESPHome etc)
Every time I visit the big box stores, I see Wi-Fi as the primary means of connecting to the smart home ecosystem. Do you see this trend changing in the future, why from the average consumer prospective? Especially with thread?
schobi
I've built a KNX house about 10 years ago and I'm still quite happy. Let me share some experience:
Having the light switch on the smartphone does not make it any smarter, just more complex.
The following automations are the most valuable for me:
- automatic blinds. Go down when too much sun hits the facade, go down when dark outside, go up with too much wind. No concern leaving for work, and coming back to an overheated living room (no AC needed). But still automatically collect the direct sun in winter/spring.
- motion sensors, turn on lights when dark and motion in the room, every room
- night mode - low level motion-activated light in all bedrooms, corridor and bathroom. No automatic lights in bedroom, orientation lights on, night light sockets on, blinds down
This brought me to rarely touching a button/switch, twice a day, maybe?
And then there is toys
- blinds can fully close when room is empty, but go to half tilted with presence, angles following the sun, for maximum natural light without direct sun
- TV lowers the blinds behind that would give a reflection
- opening the terrace door opens the blinds and turns off indoor lights, to not attract mosquitos (idk if that even helps)
- shower motion sensor turns ventilation on high
- some sockets go on/off for Christmas lights
- logging of appliances, water, ventilation, heating.
I like that the low level stuff in KNX does not need/have a central hub. But the higher level requires extra smarts. I plan to migrate those to Home Assistant this year.
forty
mosquitos are indeed not attracted by light (other insects are). I believe they are attracted by CO2 (breath) blood and sweat.
vessenes
Oh man. I love Home Assistant. But I think of it as a really fun hobby. Maintaining, getting dashboards working, integrating with wireless local network standards… It ends up very technical, very quickly, as Mr. Petersson so ably demonstrates. That said, using it has put me hard on the side of preferring home devices with open management platforms. I keep feeling there’s a chance my smart home could stay off the cloud and have good automation if only I buy the right nerd tech..
baby_souffle
I have been using Home Assistant since before "Lovelace" UI was available. It has come a long way but there's still an ongoing maintenance demand. It's less than it used to be... but it's still not zero.
> That said, using it has put me hard on the side of preferring home devices with open management platforms.
I feel like this is the true purpose of HA and the ecosystem around it. Similar to how matter is forcing IPv6 adoption on micro-controllers, really.
Every holiday season, I go looking for a bunch of cheap stuff on Ali express to tear down. Every year there's new LED light controllers and 2024 was the first year where the manufacturers were almost _bragging_ about how they label the GPIO pins and expose the programming interface so you can throw your own firmware on there if you want. Seriously, never before have I seen these controllers BRAG about how they support WLED natively. The FOSS / DIY / I'm not using _your_ cloud, I have one at home, already movement is ... actually being catered to!? That's _new_.
alias_neo
"Offline" has been my number one rule for home automation since I started using HA about a decade ago.
I have a couple of hundred devices connected to it now, and the _only_ cloud integration I use is Spotify, for obvious reasons; I have been careful when buying smart things that they're completely offline, and anything I buy that _is_ smart but isn't offline-only gets hobbled into a "dumb" appliance; e.g. my new dishwasher has "smart" stuff, if I connect it to Wi-Fi, I found the maintenance menu and disabled the network interface entirely and it's just a regular dishwasher now, which is how I like it.
ryandrake
I try to avoid all smart devices, but I moved into a house that already had "smart" garage door openers installed, so I thought I'd try the smartness. It is indeed ridiculous in that it requires an Internet connection to work. Here I am, with a remote control device (my phone) that is on my LAN and a garage door opener that is on my LAN, but I need to do a round trip to the Internet to communicate with it? What idiot designs these things?
alias_neo
There has been some uproar lately about a particular manufacturer shutting down access to the API used for their garage door openers to HA, I forget the name but there was a Q in it I believe.
The solution, as I understand it, is a little device which talks the protocol of the door opener that gives you fully local access the way it should be.
I'll try and dig out the link now in case it's of use to you.
EDIT: Here you go https://www.home-assistant.io/blog/2023/11/06/removal-of-myq... Hopefully that can point you towards a solution for your opener (and the state of affairs).
pimlottc
Look at it from the vendor’s perspective. Most people still want to be able to access and control their home from outside their home network, which generally means going through a hosted server, so why go to the extra trouble of implementing a separate method for local LAN only when you could just use the same central server? It’s almost always the case that the local LAN can access the internet, so there’s not much incentive to make it more efficient.
Yes, ideally the local user should just hit the local hub directly, but it’s double the development effort for negligible benefit.
m463
> What idiot designs these things?
This is carefully planned.
philjohn
I worked around this by exposing most HA entities to HomeKit using the built-in HomeKit bridge.
That way you get all the "this is just integrated with Siri and it's easy for non technical people to control" as well as much more powerful automations.
For example, my home presence detection is actually powered by HomeKit automations which flip binary sensors I've exposed from HA.
movedx
I’m moving away from this level of automation in my home. At the most, I’m thinking of a smart panel that can turn on/off/dim simple, non-smart LED bulbs throughout the main living area, and that’s it.
Right now I have expensive (at the time) GU10 LIFX bulbs you can no longer get. They’re not operating on and off at the wall, because my wifi settings changed and I couldn’t be arsed having to reconfigure 14 bulbs by manually resetting them, unscrewing them, and then slowly and painfully register g them on the wifi. I’ve probably created a lot of my own pain here because I could have used a dedicated SSID for that infra that never changes… oh well.
Also, in the time the smart bulbs have become idiot bulbs, I’ve never needed to really dim them, change their colour, or do anything smart.
I sort of feel like the idea is a good one but really it’s overthinking a really simple idea: turning a light on.
I don’t know. Maybe I’m under thinking this? Would love some thoughts.
lannisterstark
I'm currently building a local LLM (multiple threads - one for each sensor suite) sensor array for more proactive needs. I don't want it else conditions, and I don't want to turn lights on when I do x or y. The sensors are cheap and plenty on AliExpress and all it takes is an esp32-s3 or similar.
A smart home should predict my needs dynamically rather than do stuff based on predefined conditions and is more than just "turn living room red."
Havoc
> I could have used a dedicated SSID for that infra
Just move the phones and laptops onto a fresh 5ghz ssid
Then the old 2.4ghz becomes the iot one
flyinghamster
The main use I see for smart bulbs is to put wall-switch lamps on timers. Then again, that could be done with a smart dimmer instead.
Too bad so many of these "smart" devices insist you talk with a server in China (or anywhere other than your own LAN!) to turn on the lights.
ocdtrekkie
Most smart home tech is sold because it sounds or looks cool, not because it is actually helpful. For instance, smart bulbs are dumb because they break the most obvious correct control in your house: The light switch. Smart switches are a lot better of an idea, and they recognize the reality that most of the time the best time to turn on the light is by touching the switch when entering a room.
Monitoring can be really useful and some subtle scheduled controls can be a nice touch, but people go very dumb and very overboard.
zxvkhkxvdvbdxz
> Smart switches are a lot better of an idea, and they recognize the reality that most of the time the best time to turn on the light is by touching the switch when entering a room.
i went with precense sensors instead, stuff light up as i move across the house, and will be removing the switches.
ghostpepper
why not leave the switches for emergencies?
ocdtrekkie
You know what I really hate when I am up at 3 AM trying to move about the house without being blinded? Probably your lights.
jcgrillo
Smart switches (at least for lights) seem to me like a solution in search of a problem. Why would I ever need to turn on lights when I'm not there? If I am there, what's wrong with just using the switch?
I am using HA for something else. I'm building some ESP32 based "smart" thermostats to collect temperature and humidity data as well as exert some control over my minisplits. The only viable interface is IR so that's taking a little work to place a transmitter and receiver appropriately s.t. my wall mounted device meshes well with the existing remote control. The end goal is to integrate with the hydronic backup to create a hybrid heat system.
It's frustrating I have to build all this myself. This shit should all just work that way out of the box, without the "GE Cloud" or whatever. But I'm glad it's made relatively easy by tools like HA and microcontroller dev boards.
bigstrat2003
> Why would I ever need to turn on lights when I'm not there?
The use case I have is to turn off lights when I'm not there. My wife frequently leaves lights on when exiting a room, so it is often useful to turn the lights off remotely. Voice control is nice too, for the situations when my hands are full and I can't hit a switch.
movedx
Actually, I’d have them come on to at the same time the cleaner is due. Or the dog walker. I DO intend on a smart lock for the front door.
ocdtrekkie
So smart switches are solving two problems instead of one problem: When you want to automate it, you can. When you just need it to work conventionally as a light switch without breaking your automation, it also does that. They are the no-compromise solution.
iforgotpassword
For me the number one priority is to make the "smartness" additional, and not change how I interact with my home in general. This is mostly to satisfy the SO-acceptance factor and also not to confuse visitors, especially elderly like my parents.
In particular:
1) there are light switches that work as expected
2) you can adjust the temp on the TRVs
3) if the HA instance blows up, shit should still work
What this means in practice:
1) I have motion sensors in some rooms that might turn on the main lights or some smaller lamp in a corner if it's past midnight (eg in kitchen), but the light switch will always turn on/off the main lights. If no motion is detected for X minutes all lights turn off.
2) if my mom comes to visit and feels cold in the evening, she can just turn a dial like she did her entire life. No app, no touch buttons on the TRV, no "hey Google... Or was it sori? Siri? Son, help me out!" The smartness lies in having a general schedule, and then again motion detectors that reset the TRVs back to that schedule if they were adjusted manually and no motion was detected for 15 minutes.
3) This means I don't have smart bulbs, but relays in the light switches that do not run in detached mode. For TRVs this obviously works since they have dials.
connicpu
Personally I consider the fact that my DIY thermostat has no buttons to change the temperature a feature, but lots of people have varying feelings on who's allowed to be adjusting the thermostat and it's good to have options :)
ryandrake
It doesn't help that half of the population seemingly doesn't understand how to use a thermostat. More than one person in my family treats it like an on-off switch. When they feel hot, they turn it down to the lowest temperature, and when they feel cold, they turn it up to the hottest temperature, and basically repeat this all day. No amount of explanation helps, about how you're just supposed to pick a comfortable temperature and it will maintain it.
connicpu
One of the nice things you can actually solve with a thermostat on your LAN! I have a button for "Just run the heat/ac for 30 minutes because I'm hot/cold in the moment", without changing the actual set point.
Gooblebrai
Isn't the problem that "comfortable temperature" is personal and circumstantial?
petee
Un-wire it and hide a second actual thermostat, then they can change it all they like since they'll never be content anyway
iforgotpassword
At least in the guest room I think you might want that, people have widely varying preferences for sleep temp, but I feel similar about the other rooms. This is why the "reset on no motion" was important to me, so my mom won't turn up the heat in the living room at 10pm and then the next morning I discover my living room has turned into a sauna. ;)
I might have to add that our house is really old and has shitty insulation, so having a schedule that lowers the temp at night or when at work is also important. Keeping the temp up at acceptable levels 24/7 would be rather expensive. So when you unexpectedly are at home during those down times it's nice to be able to adjust directly at the TRV. I'm still thinking about whether I want to automate this more via motion, but since heating is not instant like turning on or off lights, you don't want to toggle the trv all the time as you enter or leave rooms...
WorldMaker
> This means I don't have smart bulbs, but relays in the light switches
In my experience, many good smart bulbs have the option to act like dumb bulbs on regular light switches. Some just return to the state they were last in when power returns, others to a "default boring light". It's one of the things that keeps me buying the more expensive smart bulbs because they are easier to configure between such options (and the third option: stay off when power returns; avoid the "bright flash wakeup" in overnight power outages in bedroom lights, for instance).
You can also emulate that somewhat easily enough in software, even if the bulb doesn't support it right, if your hub notices a light disappeared from the network and then came back, it can default the light to some useful state.
deanputney
The trouble with the bulbs is that if you turn off the switch, now your automations can't control the bulb.
I've got one bulb that occasionally loses connection. Then I have to turn it off on the switch, and the next time I go to turn it on with the automation I've got to turn the switch on again and let it connect first. This is not a seamless system.
alias_neo
I got around this by replacing my light switches with a mixture of toggle switches (ones that spring back when pressed) combined with Zigbee relays that support them, and smart switches that can be set to coupled or uncoupled.
My home office for example I set the Aqara switch to uncoupled and toggling it switches on/off the desk lamp, ceiling, bookshelf LEDs, Uplight and wall-strips behind my SKADIS, all of which are smart lights. Since it's _my_ home office, if HA is down and I can't toggle any of them using that switch, I'm probably not worried.
Areas of the house which are used by the rest of the family, have the spring-toggle switches and operate non-smart bulbs so they will function just like a normal switch/light if HA happened to be down and I'm not home to fix it.
WorldMaker
Definitely an experience that varies with model of bulb and type of network/hub. As I mentioned, I know I bought into one of the more expensive sorts for reasons like knowing that automation starts working again just about as soon as the dumb switch is flipped back on, between a tiny bit of "memory" in the bulb firmware and a reasonably reliable/quick reconnection.
It's not always a seamless system, and it varies so much in actual practice on hardware. I definitely understand why so many prefer smart switches over smart bulbs.
I also know that the silly things I want to do with colors across a day/week push me to wanting fun smart bulbs more than smart switches.
The one thing I really want is covers for some of my dumb switches, and I've seen them for cheap on places like Amazon, but haven't actually bought any or installed them, because I'm also in a situation where I don't really need SO/friend/guest buy-in/confusion-saving having people over so rarely in the last few years.
Volundr
I have Inovelli switches that have a "smart bulb" mode that lets them send commands instead of physically switching the build. I use that to make my smart bulbs respond like dumb ones to a switch, but means I also make them do smart things based on holding the switch down, double tapping, etc.
pimlottc
TRV = Thermostatic Radiator Valve
(I had to look that up)
badlibrarian
"This was before Home Assistant offered their own hardware... Home Assistant uses SQLite, and when you have a ton of sensor data flowing in, SQLite can start choking."
Their $99 hardware works great. Some devices are chatty but it's two lines in the startup config to filter the bulk of it, with no useful functionality lost.
If the data being generated by your living room is overwhelming SQLite on an eMMC, wow.
Home Assistant is one of the few recent products to delight me during setup. The sheer number of weird things it found on my network was impressive. The number of them that are dropping off as various cloud vendors try to lock things down, even more so. It has definitely motivated my future purchase choices and pushed me to simplify.
MortyWaves
Yet every single time I see HA in relation to a raspberry pi, the number one complaint is it destroying SD cards.
badlibrarian
Yes, that has been my experience with RPi in general. But there's a lotta Pis and lotta Linux versions and a lotta SD cards and a lotta hobbyists out there. Using the $99 Home Assistant Green with eMMC soldered to the board was a leap. So far no problems, nor much griping in the forums.
fullstop
I had problems in the past with the sqlite database getting corrupted on shutdown. I moved it to a postgresql database on the same VM and it's been fine since.
badlibrarian
Yeah, past experience with RPi/SD cards certainly gave me pause. No problems yet, knock wood. $99 well spent. Didn't see anything widespread in the forums and they made online backup a priority in the latest version. I like these folks, their priorities, and the community they built.
Interesting that Google Nest and Tesla are pissing everyone off at the moment. The forum is a leading indicator of brands to avoid.
nicce
Does SQLite really start choking? I feel like the issue is on configuration/ code side rather than on the database itself. It should handle thousands of writes per second, even on older Raspberry.
For this use-case, you can even likely implement own writer queue for every sensor type, and then batch insert them.
CT4u8798
I would like further detail about this also. I suspect that SQLite wasn't choking and it was something else. I cannot imagine a single home being able to overwhelm SQLite [0]. Unless the OP has a couple thousand devices all looking to write to it at the same time and they cannot queue and take turns.
mvip
Author here. The problem with SQLite is when you start having a lot of sensors. That's when SQLite failed to keep up on a Pi. Mind you, this was back on Pi 3s. It might be better today, and I know there has been performance improvements to SQLite, but for me moving to Influx for time series and MySQL for the database solved things.
Also, even on the best SD cards, you will eventually break them if you write this much.
jmmv
Came here to question this too. I have trouble with this claim because I do not see how a bunch of sensors could produce so much data as to overwhelm a Raspberry Pi...
Maybe the problem was having the database on a super-slow micro-SD card?
ImaCake
Low power sensors are only being polled every few minutes anyway. I have a dozen temp/humidity sensors and several dozen lights etc and my HA on a Pi 4 has no lag issues from it.
baq
Yeah the microSD will die eventually even if it’s a high endurance one - but it’s fine for a small installation, I’ve been running a quality one until I really started building out the sensor network. With just switches it was fine. Now running on a mid tier usb3 ssd.
poisonborz
Like many other commenters here say, however nice and increasingly better Home Assistant is, in effect you will manage 10, 20, 50+ devices that may receive updates, live in your network - whether wifi or zigbee, all have their issues - interfere with each other or just plain break.
I love the possibilities, it's often calming and nice to show off, but like with all things personal infrastructure, I have an increasing nausea and regret, along with the sunken cost fallacy.
turtlebits
Been running HA for a year or so and been rock solid. If anything, it's a buggy device that adds extra effort.
CharlesW
Eeek, is this a representative experience, HA users?
I'm HA-curious, but I use HomeKit (with Homebridge) and rarely touch it between device additions/reconfigurations.
ImaCake
HA isn't (usually) the problem, the smart devices are. Our LIFX bulbs work almost flawlessly, and the Ikea bulbs using zigbee (not the ikea hub) are yet to fail, but the small number of Tapo bulbs require an API authentication that expires eventually or whenever there is a blackout so they require me to re-enter the password.
So the tapo bulbs are getting replaced with more Ikea bulbs and I won't be buying Tapo again.
silversmith
I update my "smart home" stuff when I have the time to spare. Otherwise, things live their lives isolated form internet, with auto-updates disabled.
Yes, there are exceptions, like non-local-control devices. But fingers crossed, those have not given me much grief yet.
alias_neo
Nice write-up OP.
I've been using HA a little longer than yourself and took the exact same steps a few years ago. It's good to see we ended up at the same "conclusion".
I decided to buy dedicated hardware for HA as opposed to the VM approach as I wanted it to be completely independent from my home servers running non-critical tasks. I bought a Minisforum mini-PC with far-far overkill performance, RAM and storage for HA, but that's just how I roll.
With well over 100 devices, I switched to MariaDB and Influx too, I also solved the heating a couple of years ago, here's a quick summary:
I have a BLE temperature sensor in every room of the house (Switchbot Meter Plus), and I have a Z-Wave TRV on each radiator, I grouped the values into upstairs and downstairs for day/night with some exceptions for home offices, and calculate a sort of "average" temperature.
With some scripts to create a hysteresis, I turn the overall heating on/off when the "average" temperature is below set temperature - 0.2C or above set temperature + 0.3C, each room has an individual set temperature and I turn off the TRV if that room goes above the set temperature and back on if it drops below, again with some light hysteresis.
I then have some automations to switch to day/night/away modes with different set temperatures and rooms on/off depending on the situation.
As for lighting, I use "Circadian Lighting" which _does_ allow light groups, so I just specify the groups in yaml and it takes care of the group as a whole. I think it's probably lacking some functionality of the Adaptive Lighting plugin, but I haven't had to worry about differences in bulb types, I have a mix of Hue (80% of my bulbs) and IKEA (white only and colour).
mvip
> As for lighting, I use "Circadian Lighting" which _does_ allow light groups, so I just specify the groups in yaml and it takes care of the group as a whole. I think it's probably lacking some functionality of the Adaptive Lighting plugin, but I haven't had to worry about differences in bulb types, I have a mix of Hue (80% of my bulbs) and IKEA (white only and colour).
Author here. Interesting. I wasn't able to make the groups work either with Flux or with Adaptive Lighting. Not sure why, but I didn't spend too many cycles on it tbh.
Also, good ideas on the heating. Will look at that.
moepstar
> on/off when the "average" temperature is below set temperature - 0.2C or above set temperature + 0.3C, each room has an individual set temperature and I turn off the TRV if that room goes above the set temperature and back on if it drops below, again with some light hysteresis.
Until you discover the generic thermostat helper :)
vinc
Indeed! I started with rules to turn on or off my individual heaters based on the temperature of the room but that's too many rules to setup and update. Then I found the generic thermostat helper and my appreciation for HA immediately went one lever higher!
alias_neo
I am using that already, I may have missed some features but it didn't seem to support the more complex requirements I had for my heating.
I use the helper to manage the overall heating, by giving it my calculated "average" as the target sensor, and I use the home/away/sleep values.
The complexity in my setup is managing individual rooms which I control independently of the overall heating state; it's a fairly large home for the UK and an old one, some rooms come up to temperature much quicker than others and I want them at different temperatures too, so each room is switched as a separate zone using its TRV and sensor.
camgunz
I would use HA only to get off limited/bad "smart home" apps, but we've been using it in my home for ~6mos for a handful of things and we love it. Probably gonna go ham this year: switches, sensors, the whole thing. I think my most in-depth project is wiring up some temperature-sensitive PWM fans inside an IKEA cabinet that houses a bunch of tech stuff (gaming consoles, voltage converter, modem, router, HA machine, laser printer, etc) to keep it from overheating, which I'm very excited to get going on. Other pie in the sky plans/ideas:
- Wireless plant water sensors
- Blind/curtain management
- Ventilation management based on PM/VOC/CO2
I'm not that into smart locks or doorbell cams... or cameras in general? Feels a little creepy, but I can see the appeal I suppose.
alias_neo
We use Frigate with our cameras and doorbell cam, it can detect people, animals etc depending on how you configure it; We've got our doorbell cam set up to announce via TTS how many people are approaching the door before they even get close enough to press the doorbell; great for delivery people who leave parcels on the door step and don't ring, as well as general security.
camgunz
Wow that's wild, hmm OK might reconsider.
grahamj
Frigate rocks, I love all the zany things it can detect. Want to know if there's a zebra, snowboard or teddy bear at your door? You got it!
You can announce if someone is wearing glasses or has a handbag.
spicyusername
I have over 100 devices connected to Home AssistantEvery time I dip my toes into "smart" devices, the required operational maintenance of fiddling with them to keep them working always pushes me back to the tried and true workflow of just flipping a light switch.
Toutouxc
FWIW, I’m at ~50 devices (in a two bedroom apartment, so quite dense), and I spend maybe 5 minutes a month on average maintaining my HA instance and automations. It takes some fiddling to make the automations bulletproof, but once you’re there, it’s entirely hands off.
cyrialize
I'm not a huge smart home guy. I just have a doorbell camera, a camera, a smart plug, a smart switch, and a light bulb - all running through an Apple TV.
When I originally bought my home I was thinking of making everything smart, but I realized all of this was enough for me.
That being said - I'm absolutely STOKED that there are smart thermostatic radiator valves.
I will say for OP though - it may be worth having an expert come in and check on your radiators to help balance your system (or you could do this yourself).
Checking to see if radiators have the correct pitch, if you have the right sized radiator for your home, if you have the right pipes insulated, etc.
My impression was that if you get all the balancing right - you won't really need to fiddle with the valves again (unless of course you want to change the temperature in a room versus keeping it consistent).
I've also heard people say that it's generally a good idea to not have an adjustable radiator valve with the radiators by your thermostat - I think because when set wrong your thermostat will trigger and turn off the boiler.
I've been meaning to rebalance my home, with my first goal being to adjust the valves closest to the radiator so that they fill up the slowest.
We're in different countries so obviously you won't be able to use the contractors I used - but mine were wonderful. Their specialty is steam heat - nothing else. To get a new boiler they had me measure all of my radiators and say what type each one was. This helps figure out the correct boiler size, since most houses don't have the correct ones.
pandora-health
Wait until you discover https://github.com/Alexwijn/SAT your smart autotune thermostat!
Founder of Home Assistant here. Let me know if anyone has any questions about the project or the Open Home Foundation (which now owns Home Assistant, ESPHome etc)