How to: Instal HomeAssistant Core on Raspberry Pi 4B

Source: HomeAssistant Official Site

Prerequisites

This guide assumes that you already have an operating system setup and have installed Python 3.8 (including the package python3-dev) or newer.

INSTALL DEPENDENCIES

Before you start make sure your system is fully updated, all packages in this guide are installed with apt, if your OS does not have that, look for alternatives.

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade -y

Bash

Install the dependencies:

sudo apt-get install -y python3 python3-dev python3-venv python3-pip libffi-dev libssl-dev libjpeg-dev zlib1g-dev autoconf build-essential libopenjp2-7 libtiff5 tzdata

Bash

CREATE AN ACCOUNT

Add an account for Home Assistant Core called homeassistant. Since this account is only for running Home Assistant Core the extra arguments of -rm is added to create a system account and create a home directory. The arguments -G dialout,gpio,i2c adds the user to the dialout, gpio and the i2c group. The first is required for using Z-Wave and Zigbee controllers, while the second is required to communicate with GPIO.

sudo useradd -rm homeassistant -G dialout,gpio,i2c

Bash

CREATE THE VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENT

First we will create a directory for the installation of Home Assistant Core and change the owner to the homeassistant account.

sudo mkdir /srv/homeassistant
sudo chown homeassistant:homeassistant /srv/homeassistant

Bash

Next up is to create and change to a virtual environment for Home Assistant Core. This will be done as the homeassistant account.

sudo -u homeassistant -H -s
cd /srv/homeassistant
python3.8 -m venv .
source bin/activate

Bash

Once you have activated the virtual environment (notice the prompt change to (homeassistant) homeassistant@raspberrypi:/srv/homeassistant $) you will need to run the following command to install a required Python package.

python3 -m pip install wheel

Bash

Once you have installed the required Python package it is now time to install Home Assistant Core!

pip3 install homeassistant

Bash

Start Home Assistant Core for the first time. This will complete the installation for you, automatically creating the .homeassistant configuration directory in the /home/homeassistant directory, and installing any basic dependencies.

hass

Bash

You can now reach your installation via the web interface on http://homeassistant.local:8123. or http://<IP ADDRESS>:8123

Running HomeAssistant Command for the First time

When you run the hass command for the first time, it will download, install and cache the necessary libraries/dependencies. This procedure may take anywhere between 5 to 10 minutes. During that time, you may get “site cannot be reached” error when accessing the web interface. This will only happen for the first time, and subsequent restarts will be much faster.

For Steps on How To Auto Launch the HASS Command on Boot, Please refer to Here.