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Home Assistant

Local-first smart home, no cloud required

verified 2026-07-02Apache-2.0self-hostable
Arete score
4.5 / 5
Autonomy5
Return5
Efficiency3
Transparency5
ἀρετή “AH-reh-tay” — excellence: a thing being good at what it’s for. Mean of the four principle scores. How we score →
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✓ Verified by a human against the public rubric on 2026-07-02 · see the evidence ↓

Why it's listed

Written by the ValueIndex editor, from the verification pass of 2026-07-02.

Home Assistant is local-first smart home control: automations run in your house and keep working when the internet doesn't. Owned by the Open Home Foundation — legally unacquirable — and funded by an optional cloud subscription that buys convenience, not capability. Over 2,000 integrations. We verified foundation ownership and the local-control architecture.

Facts

License
Apache-2.0
Pricing
Free / optional cloud
Funding model
Open Home Foundation
Self-hostable
Yes — deploy difficulty: easy
Replaces
SmartThings, Alexa routines
Verification
Verified against the rubric on 2026-07-02

Evidence notes

Foundation-owned; local control; optional paid cloud funds dev; huge integration library

Recorded during the rubric pass — every score must carry evidence a stranger could re-check.

Also in home & network privacy

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