Home Assistant: Self-Hosted Home Automation

Home Assistant is an open-source home automation platform that puts local control and privacy first. With over 84,000 GitHub stars, it integrates with more than 2,000 smart home devices and services. Home Assistant runs on your own hardware, keeping your home data private while providing powerful automations, dashboards, and voice control — all without mandatory cloud subscriptions.

Self-hosting Home Assistant means your smart home works even when the internet goes down, and no company can discontinue support for your devices.

Key Features

• Integrations with 2,000+ devices including Zigbee, Z-Wave, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth
• Powerful automation engine with triggers, conditions, and actions using YAML or visual editor
• Customizable dashboards with real-time sensor data, camera feeds, and controls
• Energy monitoring with solar production tracking and grid consumption analytics
• Voice assistants with local speech processing — no cloud required
• Companion apps for iOS and Android with location tracking and notifications
• Add-on store for extending functionality with media servers, network tools, and more
• Script and template system for advanced logic and dynamic automations

Why Self-Host Home Assistant?

Local-first control. Home Assistant communicates directly with your devices over your local network. When cloud services go down or manufacturers shut down servers, your smart home keeps working. Lights, locks, thermostats, and sensors all respond instantly without internet round-trips.

Complete privacy. Every sensor reading, camera snapshot, location update, and automation log stays on your server. Unlike cloud-based smart home platforms, Home Assistant never sends your data to external servers. Your daily routines, occupancy patterns, and home security data remain truly private.

No subscription fees. Commercial smart home hubs increasingly require monthly subscriptions for full functionality. Home Assistant provides all features — automations, remote access, voice control, and integrations — at no ongoing cost. Your only expense is the hardware it runs on.

Vendor independence. Mix and match devices from any manufacturer. Home Assistant bridges ecosystems that normally don't communicate — connect IKEA lights with Ring cameras, Ecobee thermostats with Xiaomi sensors. You are never locked into a single vendor's ecosystem.

System Requirements

Resource	Minimum	Recommended
CPU	2 vCPUs	4 vCPUs
RAM	2 GB	4 GB
Storage	32 GB SSD	64 GB SSD
OS	Ubuntu 22.04+	Ubuntu 24.04

Home Assistant is typically run on local hardware (Raspberry Pi, mini PC) for direct access to Zigbee/Z-Wave radios. A VPS deployment works well for cloud-based integrations, dashboards, and automations that don't require local device radios.

Getting Started

Deploy Home Assistant on your VPS using Docker Compose through Dokploy. Our deployment guide covers the containerized setup, including persistent configuration storage, SSL access, and integration with cloud-connected devices.

Deploy Home Assistant with Dokploy →

Alternatives

• OpenHAB — Java-based home automation with extensive binding support and rule engine
• Domoticz — Lightweight home automation system with broad hardware support
• Gladys Assistant — Privacy-first smart home assistant with a modern interface
• Node-RED — Flow-based automation tool often used alongside Home Assistant for complex logic

FAQ

Can I run Home Assistant on a VPS instead of locally? Yes, but with limitations. A VPS deployment works for cloud-based integrations (weather, calendar, APIs) and remote dashboards. For local device control (Zigbee, Z-Wave, Bluetooth), you need hardware with physical radios — typically a Raspberry Pi or mini PC at home.

How many devices can Home Assistant handle? There is no hard limit. Users commonly run 100-500+ devices. Performance depends on your hardware and the polling frequency of integrations. The recommended specs handle most home setups comfortably.

Does Home Assistant work with Apple HomeKit? Yes. Home Assistant includes a HomeKit Bridge integration that exposes your devices to Apple's Home app and Siri. This lets you control Home Assistant devices through Apple's ecosystem while keeping Home Assistant as the central hub.

Is Home Assistant difficult to set up? The initial setup has a learning curve, especially for complex automations. However, the UI-based automation editor, integration marketplace, and active community make it accessible. Most integrations are point-and-click through the web interface.

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App data sourced from selfh.st open-source directory.