There are countless open-source solutions in the smart home sector. Undoubtedly, HomeAssistant and openHAB are among the most popular applications used in smart homes under an open-source license.
Let's take a look 'under the hood' of both solutions and examine how they are technically structured and who is responsible for providing them.
| openHAB | HomeAssistant | |
|---|---|---|
| Sprache | Java und OSGI | Python |
| Entwicklung | Community only | Community / kommerziell (Nabu Casa) |
| Automatisierung | UI-basierend, Blockly, JavaScript, Python, Ruby, etc. | UI |
| User Interface | Charts, Floor Plans, Maps, Tabbed Pages, Layouts (Blocks, Masonry, Grid, Canvas), deklarative Sitemaps | Charts, Maps, Layouts (Sections, Masonry) |
| Cloud | free-to-use | 6.50$/Monat – (Stand 2025) |
| Komplexität | hoch | medium-hoch |
| Updates | 2 Updates/Jahr-hohe Testqualität | mehrere Updates/Jahr – nicht so gut getestet |
The comparison above shows two criteria that explain why openHAB is closer to the actual open-source idea than HomeAssistant.
Firstly, the development of openHAB is purely 'community-driven', and secondly, unlike HomeAssistant, there are no commercial dependencies such as those associated with cloud usage.
For this reason, Converge-IT relies on openHAB when it comes to Smart Home or Smart Factory use cases.