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Which Home Assistant Android widget should you use?
The Home Assistant Companion App offers a collection of widgets rather than one all-purpose widget. They bring a specific command or piece of information to your Android launcher; they do not replace a full Home Assistant dashboard. The official Android Widgets documentation describes them as a way to perform actions, display entity states, or render templates.
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| Your goal | Widget | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Run a script, scene, or other command | Action button | Triggers an action and reports whether it succeeded or failed. Authentication may be required. |
| See a value at a glance | Entity State | Displays a chosen entity’s state and, optionally, an attribute. Text size and separators are configurable; tapping can toggle or refresh supported entities. |
| Control playback | Media Player | Works with one or more media-player entities. You can configure controls such as seek, skip, source label, and volume. |
| View an image or camera snapshot | Picture | Shows the latest snapshot. It refreshes hourly or when tapped, depending on the configured tap action. |
| Display formatted or combined data | Template | Renders Home Assistant template text and supports basic HTML formatting. Rate limiting can delay updates. |
| See and complete list items | To-do | Shows items from a configured to-do list and lets you mark items complete with checkboxes. |
How do you add a Home Assistant widget to your Android home screen?
You can add a widget through your Android launcher or, on compatible entity detail pages, through Home Assistant. The widget must be created on the device where you want it to appear.
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1Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems2Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minute3Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errors- From the launcher: Open your Android launcher’s widget picker, find Home Assistant, choose the widget type, and place it on the home screen. Follow the prompts to select an entity, action, list, or other required configuration.
- From a Home Assistant entity page: If you use Home Assistant 2025.12 or newer, open a compatible entity’s details and choose Add to. Complete this flow on the Android device that should display the widget.
- To manage existing widgets: In the Companion App, go to Settings > Companion App > Manage Widgets. The Android documentation also describes editing an existing widget on Android 12 by long-pressing it and choosing the edit icon.
The Companion App supports Android 6 and newer in both its Full and Minimal flavors. The documented minimum Home Assistant server version is 0.104.0. See the official Companion App setup documentation for app setup and connection details.
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Why is a Home Assistant widget not updating?
Start with Android’s restrictions on background data. Home Assistant widgets do not work with Data Saver enabled, and the app must be allowed to use background data. If either setting blocks the app, a widget may be stale or fail to load.
- Turn off Android Data Saver, or make sure Home Assistant is allowed to use data while Data Saver is on.
- In Android’s app data settings, confirm that background data is allowed for Home Assistant. Menu names vary by Android version and device maker.
- Check the widget’s expected refresh behavior. The documented default update interval is every 30 minutes while the screen is on; that is not a promise of instant updates for every widget.
- If you need real-time updates and use a recent Android version, enable Home Assistant notification access in Android’s notification settings. The Companion App documentation says the Real-time item can remain the only selected option. More frequent updates can affect battery life, especially when the entity changes often.
- If the widget still does not work, remove it and create it again.
Some widget types have their own refresh limits. For example, a Picture widget refreshes hourly or on tap, depending on its tap action, while Template updates can be delayed by rate limiting. Turning on real-time updates should not be treated as a guarantee that every widget type will refresh immediately.
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Can you control Home Assistant from an Android widget?
Yes. An Action button can run a configured command, and other widgets provide controls suited to their content, such as media playback or supported entity toggles. If you want controls in Android’s system interface rather than on the home screen, two separate Companion App features may fit better.
Android Device Controls
On compatible Android 11 or newer devices, Home Assistant entities can appear in system surfaces such as Quick Settings, the notification drawer, or the power menu. Supported domains include lights, locks, switches, media players, climate, covers, fans, scripts, and scenes, among others. The available surfaces depend on the device maker and Android version. Lock-screen behavior also varies: Android 11 allows controls while locked, Android 12 does not, and Android 13 and newer provide a setting. Details are in the official Android Device Controls documentation.
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Quick Settings tiles live in the notification shade, not on the home screen. The feature is available on Android 7.0 and newer and supports up to 40 configurable tiles, which can invoke selected actions or toggle supported domains. See the official Android Quick Settings documentation.
| Option | Where it appears | Best suited to |
|---|---|---|
| Home-screen widget | Android launcher | A glanceable value, a specific action, media controls, a picture, a template, or a to-do list. |
| Device Controls | Supported Android system surfaces | Operating compatible Home Assistant entities through device-level controls. |
| Quick Settings tile | Notification shade | Quickly invoking a selected action or toggling a supported domain. |
These are different ways to surface Home Assistant, not interchangeable names for the same widget feature. Pick based on where you want the control and what you need to do with it.
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