If I am not mistaken the tradeoff is losing add-ons but being able to install other services.
So… what is your experience? Are add-ons useful/common for your use case?
I used a ton of AddOns, really practical because they also embed themselves easily into the rest of Home Assistant. I would go for the HA OS. But I also do wish there was a AddOn to install random docker images.
You can go supervised! You still have most of the operating system available to your needs and you can still use add-ons. I use it for years and it works like a charm
I’m running the docker version as I’m also using the rpi for other things, like imageview and pi hole. I don’t really miss addons, the only annoying thing is that most documentation assumes you’re running ha os.
But if you don’t plan to use it for anything else than HA, I’d go for HA OS.
I run my own a VM.
I was sceptical about running in a OS that I can’t run my normal updates and automations on but HA OS has been rock solid and easy. Plus you get a few more features
I second that, I just put it in a VM on my proxmox host. zero issues so far.
I’ve run both, and the OS version is much more stable and easier to keep running. Whether you use an rpi or a VM, use the dedicated OS and save yourself the heartache of trying to get your hardware working with docker.
home assistant in docker is definitely not for the feint of heart! the networking requirements are actually quite intense, and really don’t map well to virtual networks like dockers uses
… among other issues
HAOS on a pi; i’ve tried the docker thing time and time again, and the next chance i get in blowing it all away and starting on real hardware again
HA OS is the way to go.
You don’t want to have to think about it. HA OS just works. You set it up and let it run.
There’s no sense in trying to kerfuffle other things into it. You don’t want to do too much on the Pi anyway because it’ll lower the responsiveness of Home Assistant slightly. If you want a server that does things, buy a separate NAS and run it alongside HA OS.
This is what I do with a Pi running HAOS and a Synology ds920+ running backups and everything else. It’s been rock solid, gives me a decent backup solution, my home automation is stable and responsive and no-fuss, and plenty of options for tinkering. Highly recommend.
I definitely prefer HA in a VM, that way it can do its own thing and I won’t accidentally break something.
I recommend HA OS. What happened to me is that I used docker, got everything set up how I liked it, then had to move over to HA OS when I needed a specific add on and didn’t have any other solution.
If you don’t already have a plan for other services, might not make sense to use docker, too.
I used the fanciest possible setup with HA running in a Kubernetes cluster and its helper services likewise, but that’s severe overkill for most people unless they’ve got compute to burn and need/want/enjoy customizing the heck out of everything.
A Pi, even a Pi 4, isn’t compute to burn but also isn’t expensive enough to need other services on it to justify it. For what it’s worth, I’d suggest HA OS and dedicating the Pi to it.
You can also run hass os in a vm then you still get add-ons, from what I understand
You can also run hass os in a vm then you still get add-ons, from what I understand
I’d always run HAOS. When you need Docker containers which are not available as add-ons I would look for a machine that can run Proxmox so you can run a Docker VM and a HAOS vm in parallel.
I run the docker because it’s really easy to migrate to another machine if I needed. I just rsync the data and re-run the yaml on the new machine and I’m back up within seconds.
Home assistant OS is also my recommendation. Add-ons are pretty important IMO. Plus for something I am planning to try and have 100% uptime and controlling my home smart devices I don’t want it containerized and at the mercy of docker.
Currently using 15 add-ons myself.
