HA OS vs Supervised

yes im sure we all(most) know the difference between “Supervisor” and supervised" , but in common “terminology” most people talking about HA-setup uses “Supervisor” for a supervised, installation … the reason i chosed to start with “Supervised”, was that 1. i might have a “control-issue” :slight_smile: , 2. i wanted “Supervisor” functionality as-well, and i had no experience in regards to HA , as mentioned above, most reason for home-automation is to make life easier, convenient and comfortable
… and cant say i regret starting out, with “Supervised” with supervisor, but after 5-6 month, i took it offline, main reason i wanted to “transfer” various devices into a common “concept”, and the choice felt on HA, after some research, and i’ve been around since mid 80th, first pc, IBM, with intel i80286, worked with server-administration, integration, network, hardwareupgrade etc. etc… … what could go wrong ?
… well 1. i wanted an easy maintained environment, with the least amount of time spend using VI, emacs or notepad++ ( therefore the brilliant “Supervisor”)
… 2.And maybe most important, learn about HA, ( thou ofcause also including yaml,py etc.) … October i took “Supervised” offline for same reasons, and “bite the dust” installed HA in VM … On Windows ( so when i say , id like to go towards hass-os in vm i mend, in VB, on linux, so far im soo satisfied with ( recommended supported) installation in windows , performance-vice absolutely not a reason to not choose this setup( maybe because i’ve been around for a while, and know that “time!” chances, “resource” is just a matter of thinking ahead, and in a vm on windows i have 8 add-ons, 25 integrations( not counting HACS-frontend), and it’s been so must more fun ( AND less time spend, on the tasks i was looking to reduce, maintenance ) … i have already forgot the hassle, irritation, and time i spend on “Supervised” , joined this forum, when i redesigned my “home” network due to new router, that can handle the load, have most devices integrated ( that i had “i store”), so i could lean back, if it wasn’t for the “Big” task ahead, integrate my heating/cooling system
… yes i did realized that, “poking” around in HA’s OS (in a VM) had to be done via ssh or so, and as i also have no experience from “Container” topology, this was also new to me, … to sum upp i find way more benefit with VM/VB setup as im retired (not retarded, as some might think :slight_smile:

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Apparently not, because they’re using the two terms interchangeably yet the terms define different things.

Only those who don’t understand the difference or don’t know what they’re talking about. For example, I recently encountered someone who used the terms integration and add-on interchangeably (and attempted to justify it). :man_shrugging:


If anyone is struggling with the maintenance of Debian (which is the primary distinguishing feature between Home Assistant Supervised and Home Assistant OS) then they should consider switching to Home Assistant OS.

Personally, I haven’t found it to be much of a bother to keep Debian updated. I think the most maintenance work I faced was installing os-agent and upgrading from Debian 10 to Debian 11. Both are documented in a straightforward manner so the process didn’t require much of my time.

I think the one time I felt it was an inconvenience was when I switched from Ubuntu to Debian. I had considered switching to Home Assistant OS but, at the time, the version of Linux kernel it was using didn’t contain driver support for one of my devices. Whether it now contains it or not is moot because everything works fine in Debian.

You haven’t thought about, and tried to respect/accept that people see things from a different “perspective” than you ? … i would not get into a discussion with you in regards to “add-on vs integration”, as i might use the “terms” interchangeably
My first Debian, and only “personal” choice since, was in 99 (the year1999) … not to confuse

I’ve still been putting this off, you have any useful links for the process before I google it?

That’s a straw man argument; using terminology incorrectly isn’t a different perspective, it’s simply wrong.

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I followed francisp’s instructions in this post:

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… what ?

“”" That’s a straw man argument; using terminology incorrectly isn’t a different perspective, it’s simply wrong. “”"

… and i thought i had “control” issues

was you first statement here mend as “solution” to orig. subject ?

You can call your cat a dog as much as you like until you go asking others why your dog is meowing all day long :rofl:

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Where the OP can be found here.

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Some advantages that I used to have with supervised (because now I have a pure HA OS) were:

Linux, for other purposes: you can share the same device for HA, Plex server, NAS, etc…

Anydesk control of HA and the whole Linux system (I know, you can use/configure/modify HA in many ways, but it was one more way, a way that I use a lot)… but if you like to use CMD commands or Linux programs, that’s a way.

Programming: As I’m a python coder, I use to run scripts and show results inside home assistant, for example a python script to webscrapping, saving target data in a CSV and showing last update on HA… also to control a script with HA (a python program to control a Coffee Machine, with a switch inside HA, like any other device).

Well, I can think about some other examples, but if you are a normal user or if you prefer to keep HA separated from your server… better go for HA OS :slight_smile:

I run a lot of different things on my homeserver but decided to go for HAOS using Proxmox. Super stable.

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My opinion: If you are Linux-skilled enough to run a proxmox server, you don’t need HAOS or supervised. Use the plain docker container.

Whatever is offered through addons (the only actual reason to them) is for non-techies. Everything that is done in addons is some “re-packaging” of what you can do yourselves.

Using a VM for HA while you can avoid it is a waste of resources.

Why should I have to do more work than necessary?? What is it I get more not using HAOS?. I have a LOT of resources so that is not a problem.

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Err. I cannot argue against that way of thinking, indeed…
Just taking note in case you’d ask for the community to help you in the future :slight_smile:

What stupid answer is that. Why should my opinion have anything to do with my possible future questions?

Because it tells me that you’re following the easy path, so that you are likely to ask a question without having taken the effort to help yourself, first.
Obviously, telling me that I’m stupid puts an end to this digression.

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Please don’t devolve into name calling.

While perusing the rest of this topic I noticed a lot of reference to running other software on a supervised install. I though that was against the conditions laid out in the ADR: https://github.com/home-assistant/architecture/blob/b85484512dd8f27338c6ae2ff28e9a7cf78abb2f/adr/0014-home-assistant-supervised.md#additional-supported-conditions

  • No additional software, outside of the Home Assistant ecosystem, is installed.
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@tom_l, please note this table. It is the reason why I originally selected Supervised. I am learning but still somewhat new to the game it was an effort but I am now comfortable with maintaining it and am up to speed with how to manage everything… BUT!

  1. Is the below table accurate?
  2. I want to (A.) run other things on the same piece of hardware (or connect to other machines running those things so everything can be reached with the same functionality as though they were running on the same hardware), but also cannot lose (B.) access to the HACS (Home Assistant Community Store). What would you suggest as the next best step - if we had to move away from Supervised - to be able to have both A and B (I think I had heard suggestions from people that I run HAOS in a VM to be able to run other things on the same hardware if I needed (?) - what are the pros and cons of the various approaches etc.)?

Where is it from?

If it’s not an official source like the ADR it could be out of date or inaccurate as it directly contradicts it.

All installation types can run HACS, it is a third pert integration, not an addon.

How do you want to run the other software?

As add-ons, Docker containers or straight up apps on the OS?

I had information I saw from somewhere that I put into a spreadsheet and then colored the items myself to determine which one to choose. I wil stop using it - (or better yet correct it) -

  1. So in answer to your question - where can I find a comparison chart that is accurate?
  2. I am not sure what I want to do, I just want to better understand the options available. I have supervised runnng on a RPI 4b w/8Gig of ram without any sd card, running totally off a 1TB ssd. I want to go to the next step and add video but I knoiw the hardware is lacking for that - some people say you can have the video on a different machine (but names have to be more than 10 characters with frigate or something like that), others say it’s better integraton if it’s on the same machine, I just want to fully understand all of my options - with regards to home assistant itself - before determining which direction to go -

Thanks for your help @tom_l !