I’ve been thinking about the future of Home Assistant and how it could become a true competitor in the home automation market. Currently, Home Assistant relies heavily on integrations with various third-party hardware solutions, which can sometimes lead to issues with reliability, compatibility, and long-term support.
Wouldn’t it make sense for Home Assistant to develop its own PLC-based flagship controller? This would be a robust, industrial-grade device designed specifically for home automation. Such a solution could address many of the challenges related to hardware fragmentation, provide a standardized foundation for automation, and position Home Assistant as a more serious competitor to commercial offerings.
Has anyone heard of any plans for something like this? Or do you think this is a direction that Home Assistant should consider exploring?
My thoughts: Home Assistant is designed for home automation, not industrial usage. Industrial usage commands higher needs for uptime and redundancy just to name a few of the many needs that you then add.
Thank you for your input! I understand that Home Assistant (HA) is designed primarily for home automation rather than industrial applications. However, my main point is that even though HA has launched its own hardware, namely Home Assistant Green and Home Assistant Yellow, these devices lack dedicated analog and digital I/O, which are standard features in PLCs (Programmable Logic Controllers).
If Home Assistant wants to compete effectively with major players in the home automation market, it needs a flagship controller that includes built-in I/O, similar to the Wago CC100. This would allow for several advantages:
Direct integration with sensors and actuators without the need for additional third-party hardware.
More reliable and responsive automation by reducing dependence on wireless protocols.
A complete, self-contained HA ecosystem that can compete with commercial home automation solutions.
Currently, users often rely on external hardware (like ESPHome, Shelly, etc.), which adds complexity and potential failure points. A dedicated HA-native controller with analog and digital I/O could bridge the gap between consumer-grade home automation and industrial-grade reliability.
Do you believe there is demand for such a device, or do you think HA’s current hardware strategy is sufficient?
For a home automation setup I think the strategy is fine. You can install it on basically what ever you want to, if the Green and Yellow does not fit your usecase. I have no knowledge on PLCs so I do not know what other major players in the home automation marked you are referring to, but my guess is that you can find (or create) integrations for at least the major ones?
The best you can get as of today might be a Ethernet connected esphome based board like something that is offered from boneio or kincoy.
This way the tighest local (push) integration can be achieved and still have maximum resilence thanks to espHome local automation/scripting capabilities.
From my point of view it would makes no sense for HA to invest resource in such projects purely because of the minefield of local regulations and laws which would be required for AC hard wired appliances.
In the six years of my involvement with Home Assistant, I have never had the impression that Paulus wished to expand in the markets that rely on industrial controllers. The focus has always been on the residential market.
Undoubtedly it’s being used for non-residential applications but at the user’s risk. All technical support for Home Assistant is informal and largely provided by volunteers.
The majority of consumer devices operate on wireless protocols so there’s low demand for a hard-wired controller device.
That’s not to say there’s zero demand. Ethernet-based I/O boards are in use (search the forum for Denkovi) as well as devices integrated via Home Assistant’s own ESPhome.
FWIW, Home Assistant used to natively support a Raspberry Pi’s GPIO but dropped it. Meanwhile, it continues to improve support for Zigbee, z-wave, Matter, etc.
tl;dr
The Home Assistant project is focused on residential applications for which the market offers numerous, inexpensive, wireless devices (for ease of installation).
Thanks for all the replies!
I understand that Home Assistant is focused on home automation and doesn’t aim to compete with industrial PLCs. However, looking at market trends, more and more new homes are being designed with wired automation in mind, and right now, there is no single native device that serves as the core for such installations within the HA ecosystem.
Solutions like BoneIO, Kincoy, and Denkovi are just integrations— additional components that require configuration and are not standalone, self-sufficient solutions.
I believe Home Assistant wouldn’t need to drastically change its strategyto introduce something like:
• A dedicated HA-native device with built-in I/O (digital and analog inputs/outputs) for wired automation.
• An expansion module (e.g., via USB) for HA Green/Yellow, enabling direct wired control without relying on third-party bridges or converters.
Looking at the long-term competition with systems like Grenton, Loxone, and other home automation solutions , it’s worth considering whether HA should explore more integrated hardware that allows users to build wired home automation systems without requiring additional gateways or workarounds .
Home Assistant is betting on open protocols, like Zigbee, Z-wave, Matter and so on.
All the integrations that cause problems are usually for closed protocols.
There is no idea in becoming another closed protocol.
I would call this a bad design. Just think about the consequences if all the logic would be in HA as a single point of failure.
“Sorry people but we are installing an update and will reboot so no (light) switches housewide will work as usual”
Correct, and if their would be one the chance might be very high that it even doesn’t fit your local regulations in #your-country-here#
I think these are all bad examples to use around local/central controllers because of limited resilence beside most not even being capable working wired.
Let’s discuss an I/O board for inputs and outputs using optocouplers or MOSFETs to control external bistable relays. This setup works well since the relays can be controlled with signals. Additionally, you can combine the outputs with a physical switch and wire them together, provided you are using the same power source. Otherwise, a power separator, such as a diode, will be necessary. - No issue during hardware failure or updates
Ok, Zigbee and Z-wave have their issues, but Matter is made to be resilient.
Matter can be wired and there are also other protocols, like Modbus, which can be both wireless and wired.
It was just examples of open protocols.
I understand your concern about Home Assistant (HA) being a single point of failure, but that’s not what I’m suggesting. The idea is not to have all the logic completely dependent on HA; instead, we should use an I/O board to control external bistable relays.
Here are some benefits of this approach:
Manual Control Remains Independent: Physical switches can still directly control the relays, even if HA is offline.
No Single Point of Failure: If HA goes down or is undergoing updates, the relays will retain their last state, and the physical switches will continue to function.
Flexible Control: HA can still add automation on top of the manual switching without taking over the fundamental control of the lights.
For example, by wiring the switches and the I/O board in parallel to the relays (using the same power source or a power separator like a diode), the system remains functional regardless of HA’s status. So, even in the worst-case scenario (such as HA failure or updates), basic functionality is preserved.
You can do all of this with esphome and the boards already mentioned like the kincony. Esphome and homeassistant are both part of the open home foundation.
If you want something that is well integrated with homeassistant but still works if the server is down esphome is the answer.
NO AI