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Home Assistant is renaming Home Assistant Cloud to Home Assistant Link, a mostly symbolic change that leaves the service’s features and pricing intact. Founder Paulus Schoutsen also described plans to make the platform easier to set up, including a simpler hub and an easier way to install community integrations.
Home Assistant is renaming its optional remote-access service from Home Assistant Cloud to Home Assistant Link, a change founder Paulus Schoutsen says reflects the project’s opposition to smart-home products that depend on company-run cloud services. The service’s main features and subscription prices will remain the same, while the project also plans changes aimed at making Home Assistant easier for newcomers to use.
Schoutsen told The Verge that the new name is intended in part to make clear that Home Assistant runs on local hardware, rather than in the cloud. The platform can control a smart home locally, but remote access is unavailable outside a user’s home network without an additional method. Link offers that access, along with optional internet-based features such as Alexa and Google voice control, speech services and encrypted backups.
The service costs $6.50 per month or $65 per year. Home Assistant says Link traffic is encrypted and the service does not have access to users’ data. Link is operated by Nabu Casa, Home Assistant’s commercial partner; the source report says 60 percent of its profits go to the nonprofit Open Home Foundation, which runs Home Assistant. Link is optional, and users can set up alternatives to its features themselves.
The renaming is mostly symbolic, Schoutsen said. Features are staying in place, with some backend changes intended to improve speed and reliability. The broader effort is to reduce Home Assistant’s learning curve without removing its flexibility. Schoutsen told The Verge the team is working on simpler dashboards and setup, plans to introduce a more user-friendly hub next year, and expects to bring the community-built HACS store into Home Assistant the following month.
A Local-First Alternative Seeks Wider Reach
The announcement highlights a distinction for people choosing smart-home products: local control can let devices keep working without a company’s remote servers, while internet services can add features such as remote access, speech processing and backups. Home Assistant’s position is not that every online service is harmful; Schoutsen acknowledged that some functions work better online. His stated concern is products whose basic operation depends on a cloud service that a company can later change or shut down.
That approach may appeal to consumers concerned about privacy, reliability and long-term access to devices. It also presents a challenge for Home Assistant: the platform offers broad choice, but that flexibility can make setup and everyday use feel more complicated than mainstream alternatives. The planned interface and hardware changes matter because the project is trying to broaden its audience without giving up the local-first control that distinguishes it.
Schoutsen estimated that Home Assistant was installed in 2.7 million homes. The figure is his estimate, and the source provides no comparable market-share calculation. It nonetheless illustrates the gap between the project’s reach and that of major smart-home platforms such as Amazon Alexa, Google Home, Samsung SmartThings and Apple Home.
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Why the Service Had a Cloud Name
Home Assistant has promoted locally controlled smart homes while also offering a paid service called Home Assistant Cloud. That apparent contradiction is eased by the service’s optional status: the platform can run locally, and users do not have to subscribe to get remote access or related functions if they are willing to configure other methods. The new Link name is meant to reduce the impression that Home Assistant itself runs in a remote cloud.
Schoutsen pointed to past cases of connected products losing functions when their online services were discontinued, including early Nest thermostats and the June Oven. These are examples he cited to explain his position, not evidence that every cloud-connected product will stop working. He said he wants manufacturers to favor local control, use open standards such as Matter, Zigbee, Z-Wave, MQTT and ESPHome, and avoid putting basic features behind a cloud service. He also proposed a product-label system showing whether a device depends on the cloud.
Home Assistant’s planned usability work is part of a longer effort to bring in users who may have reached the limits of simpler mainstream systems. The project has emphasized extensive device support and customization, but those options can make initial setup harder. The aim Schoutsen described is to make basic use more approachable while retaining advanced features.
““Big tech ruined the cloud, so we’re out.””
— Paulus Schoutsen, Home Assistant founder, speaking to The Verge
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What the Rebrand Does Not Change
The source report does not give a date for when the Link name will take effect, or details about the planned backend improvements. It also does not describe the successor hub’s price, hardware specifications or release date beyond Schoutsen’s expectation that it will launch next year. The planned HACS integration was described as coming the following month, but a precise date was not provided.
It remains unclear how much the usability work will reduce the learning curve, or whether it will bring substantially more mainstream users to the platform. The report gives Schoutsen’s estimate of 2.7 million installations but no independent count, definition of an installation or market comparison. The new name alone does not change Link’s optional status, pricing, or the platform’s reliance on local hardware.
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Usability Work and a New Hub
Home Assistant’s next stated steps are to make community integrations easier to discover and install, simplify the user experience, and develop a more approachable hub for next year. The team also plans to develop a database to help consumers identify products that do not rely fully on cloud services. The report does not provide a launch schedule for that database or further detail about the proposed product-label system.
For users, the immediate change is the service’s name; its listed features and subscription prices remain unchanged. The longer-term test will be whether the planned improvements make Home Assistant easier to adopt while retaining local control and the range of devices and configurations that its users value.
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Key Questions
What is Home Assistant Link?
Home Assistant Link is the new name for Home Assistant Cloud, an optional paid service that provides remote access to a Home Assistant setup and additional internet-dependent features.
Does the name change alter the service or its price?
The Verge report says the change is mostly symbolic. The main features and prices remain the same: $6.50 monthly or $65 annually. Some backend improvements are planned.
Does Home Assistant require Link to work?
No. Home Assistant can run on local hardware and control a smart home locally. Link is optional; remote access outside the home network requires Link or another method.
What changes are planned to make Home Assistant easier to use?
Schoutsen told The Verge the team is working on simpler dashboards and setup, plans to integrate the HACS community store the following month, and is developing a more user-friendly hub for next year. Dates and product details remain limited.
What does Home Assistant mean by opposing cloud-dependent products?
Schoutsen’s concern is that devices may lose important functions if a manufacturer shuts down its servers. He said manufacturers should support local control and open standards, while recognizing that online services can be useful for features such as speech processing and backups.
Source: rss
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