head to head · open source
Home Assistant vs spook
Home Assistant has 90,832 GitHub stars, 38,710 forks, 3,527 open issues and last shipped yesterday. spook has 1,298 stars, 91 forks, 29 open issues and last shipped yesterday. Home Assistant leads on adoption by 6,898% (90,832 vs 1,298 stars). Home Assistant is written in Python under Apache-2.0; spook is written in Python under MIT. Home Assistant has attracted 43% as many forks as stars, spook 7%. Home Assistant was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (home-automation), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| Home Assistant | spook | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 91K | ★ 1.3K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Python | Python |
| Last push | 2026-09-19 | 2026-09-19 |
| Forks | ⑂ 39K | ⑂ 91 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Home Assistant if
- You weight community size — 91K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick spook if
- You want the spook feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and spook fits your workflow better
About Home Assistant
Home Assistant is an open source home automation platform that runs locally on devices such as Raspberry Pi or a personal server. It enables users to control and automate smart home devices—including lights, thermostats, locks, and sensors—without relying on cloud services. Built in Python with an asyncio event loop, it emphasizes local processing and data sovereignty, ensuring all device data remains under the user’s control.
read the full Home Assistant overview →
About spook
Spook is a custom integration for Home Assistant that extends a Home Assistant instance with a set of extra tools, aimed at people who already run Home Assistant and want more capability without forking core components.
read the full spook overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Home Assistant or spook more popular?
Home Assistant has 90,832 GitHub stars and spook has 1,298. Home Assistant has the larger community by that measure.
Are Home Assistant and spook free?
Both are open source. Home Assistant is licensed under Apache-2.0 and spook under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Home Assistant and spook?
Home Assistant is written in Python and spook in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Home Assistant or spook?
Choose Home Assistant if you want the larger community (90,832 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose spook if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.