What is the difference from ESPHome Device Builder Add-on and ESPHome Integration, and under what conditions would ESPHome Device Builder be preferred over the integration?
I mean, the Integration dashboard does the same as the add-on, so why would one need the add-on?
The add-on is for programming ESPHome devices, the integration is only for communicating with them.They perform quite different tasks which is why the add-on was recently renamed to “device builder”
They do different things.
Add-on= write yaml, compile firmware and flash to the Node. This is not necessary if you buy a node pre-flashed with ESPHome. Therefore it is only needed if you wish to write your own firmware
Integration = what it says. Allows a means for the ESPHome node and HA to talk to each other. This way your entities / sensors show up in and can be controlled from HA
Not the same. Is this a WTH question?
I’ve been editing device configurations from the integration dashboard for years. I never knew there was an add-on.
The “integration” is reached via Settings/Devices and Services/Integrations/ESPHome and the only configuration available there is to enable service calls for a device. The add-on is reached typically via a sidebar entry and allows the device yaml to be edited and flashed. Which one are you referring to?
If the dashboard looks like this, then that’s the add-on, not the integration.
I have been using the dashboard like your image for years without installing the ESPHome add-on. Is it possible that the sidebar view was installed with the integration a few years ago?
No idea, but what you are using is the add-on. It is confusing, but then lots of HA stuff is anyway 
Home assistant docs provide some descriptions of the difference between an add-on and an integration.
I think people are more likely to get mixed up when you use both for something.
I wasn’t clear on the distinction for a long time, either. But then I found out I didn’t need the add-on, and that the integration would continue to work without it.
Now I do all my ESPHome compiling and updating devices on my laptop, using the ESPHome command-line. The laptop is where I do my development anyway. HA is a production machine. No need to bog it down doing compiles.
