Something big just happened. As the Open Home Foundation’s Android developer for Home Assistant, I was invited by the European Commission to consult on Android interoperability. On July 16, 2026, the Commission adopted a decision requiring Alphabet to open up eleven Android features — including always-on wake word detection, ambient sensor access, and screen automation — to all assistants, on equal terms.

The Open Home Foundation fights for privacy, choice, and sustainability. These principles are at the heart of everything we do, including how we handle website analytics. Our position is clear: we reject tools that track individuals across the web to monetize their data. Instead, we want aggregated, anonymized analytics that show how our websites are performing overall — without identifying who our visitors are, or compromising their privacy.

Sound the alarm, because Works with Home Assistant just welcomed our newest partner to the program: FireAvert! 🎉 Specialists in fire safety, FireAvert are on a mission to keep you and your home out of harm’s way. They bring the very first gas and electric appliance shutoff devices to the program, and with them, a whole lot of peace of mind.

Ever since we introduced the idea of a community-powered device database at State of the Open Home 2025, our goal has been clear: create a “Wikipedia of smart home devices” based on real-world usage. In February, we took the first step by inviting Home Assistant users to voluntarily share anonymized device data to help us build it.

The Works with Home Assistant program powers up this month as we welcome our new partner, IoTorero! 🎉 Experts in pre-flashed smart home hardware, IoTorero bring the very first ESPHome-ready smart plugs and relays to the program (and that’s not all).

We’re updating which Apple platforms the Home Assistant Companion app supports, and because transparency is core to how we work, we want to be upfront about what’s changing.

Starting with version 2026.8.0 of the Companion app, we will no longer support iOS 15, watchOS 8, or macOS 11. The last supported version for these platforms will be 2026.7.1.

Home Assistant 2026.7! 🎉

This is one of those releases I’ve been looking forward to for a long time. My favorite by far is what we’ve done with automations. Purpose-specific triggers and conditions graduate from Labs and become the new default for everyone. 🎉

It comes down to something we’ve been chasing for years: more power, less complexity. Instead of starting from Home Assistant’s internals, which entity, which state, which kind of trigger, you start from what you actually want your home to do. When the bedroom drops below 18°C, turn on the heating. That’s it. No technical traps, no quirks to memorize. And because integrations can teach the automation engine their own triggers and conditions, it only gets better from here. All of it right there in our beautiful user interface.

The nice thing is, nothing breaks. All your existing automations keep working, worry-free. We’ve also written tons of great documentation explaining every single trigger, condition, and action, with examples to learn from. And if you’re one of those people who prefers writing automations in YAML instead of the UI, you’re in for an amazing experience too. User experience is not a synonym for “the UI”. YAML users deserve good user experience too.

But honestly? I’ve got a second favorite this release, and that surprised me a little. Activity, what many of you still know as the logbook, has been rebuilt into a slick and clean timeline. 😍 It reads top to bottom like a feed, groups entries by day, and finally speaks the same language as the rest of Home Assistant. I keep opening it just to look at it.

And that’s just the start. There’s a new update-all button, dedicated panels for infrared and radio frequency, an overhauled ZHA Zigbee device management, and 10 new integrations from our community.

One more thing before you dive in: the Open Home Foundation is exhibiting at IFA Berlin for the first time, from September 4 to 8, 2026. We’d love to meet you there, so come say hello. There’s also a community meetup on Sunday, September 6, and everyone’s welcome. You can read all about it here.

Enjoy the release!

../Frenck

It started as a passion project. Yet in a few years matter.js has grown beyond my wildest expectations, becoming the backbone of the open source Matter ecosystem, and powering everything from Homebridge to openHAB, and even some commercial products.

Ten months ago, I joined forces with the Open Home Foundation to work full time as Lead Developer of Matter. Shortly after, I donated matter.js to the foundation – giving it a new home where it would be safeguarded for the future. Together we announced our plans to take Matter support in Home Assistant in a completely new direction: we set out to rebuild the Open Home Foundation Matter Server – the engine that powers Matter in Home Assistant – on matter.js.

After four months of beta testing, with our community fixing bugs and contributing new features along the way, today we’re thrilled to present the newest version of Matter for Home Assistant! 🎉

Every smart home has them: the older devices that still work perfectly well but no longer fit neatly into a modern setup. Instead of letting them gather dust in a drawer, the Open Home Foundation’s projects can help you bring them back into the fold. Here’s how a little proxying can give your beloved old gear a new lease of life, and keep your smart home that bit more sustainable.

Home Assistant 2026.6! 🎉

I’m going to put my hand up right away: ✋ I am not a dashboard person. Not because I don’t like them; I love seeing what you all build. But designing a beautiful one is a kind of visual creativity I just don’t have. That’s a big part of why I love the built-in Home dashboard so much, it does the designing for me. But when I do build a custom dashboard, I usually stare at that “add a card” dialog for way too long, picking cards almost at random just to see if they look good with the data I have.

So you can imagine my excitement for my personal favorite of this release: the new card picker. Instead of asking “which card type do I want?”, it now asks “which thing in your home do you want to show?”, and then suggests cards that actually make sense for it, with live previews using your own data. For someone like me, that’s not just easier; it’s genuinely inspiring. It nudges me towards combinations I would not have thought of on my own. 💡

This fits into a bigger direction I keep getting more excited about: Home Assistant getting better at starting from the thing you want to do, instead of asking you to first learn the building blocks. The same idea is what makes purpose-specific triggers and conditions in Home Assistant Labs feel so right, and this release brings them a big step closer to graduating out of Labs with brand new zone triggers and conditions. 📍

A close second favorite for me this release is everything happening around that in the automation editor: live test indicators on your conditions, target counts on every device, area, floor, and label, and proper notes you can attach to any step. Individually they are small quality-of-life touches; together, they make building automations feel a whole lot more transparent. ✨

And there is plenty more to love in this release: new tile card features, Z-Wave smart locks catching up with their Matter siblings, a friendlier Apps page, and another big batch of new integrations from our community. 🚀

Enjoy the release!

../Frenck