GoKawiilDhruv Bhutani / Android Authority
The latest version of Home Assistant OS made its bow last month, bringing a more streamlined setup process. While do-it-yourself smart home platforms like Home Assistant OS and Home Assistant at large are geared more towards power users, it’s always welcome when any usability improvements are pushed through.
Given how popular the smart home space seems to be with our readers (and my colleagues, to be honest), I wanted to know just how many readers deploy Home Assistant in their homes. But, more importantly, what is the most popular platform to run the smart home suite?
Andy Walker / Android Authority
We ran a poll to garner this information from our readers, and over 2,000 responded. Two platforms in particular proved the most popular in our poll, racking up a combined 64.4%.
So, which platform won? Using a virtual machine is our readers’ favorite Home Assistant deployment option, with just under a third (32.8%) of the total vote.
Virtual machines are a natural home for platforms like Home Assistant OS, thanks to their ease of updates, greater control over resource utilization, and extensibility. If you already have a dedicated server for smart home services, it makes sense to add Home Assistant OS to that list via a dedicated machine.
Virtual machines and Raspberry Pis are the preferred Home Assistant homes for many.
Notably, 14.5% use Docker to run Home Assistant in a container, which can and often does dovetail with the virtual machine option, while a further 11% run Home Assistant directly on a NAS.
Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
... continue reading