hass-mcp-server

MCP server for full Home Assistant control. AI agents (GitHub Copilot, Claude, etc.) can manage your dashboards, automations, files, apps, entities, and more — so you never have to touch HA settings yourself.

Features

• Dashboard management — Create, update, delete Lovelace dashboards and deploy full dashboard configs

• File management — Upload, read, list, and delete files on your HA instance via SFTP (e.g. custom cards, images, HTML files)

• Automations, scripts, scenes — Full CRUD for automations, scripts, and scenes

• Input helpers — Create and manage input_boolean, input_number, input_text, input_select, input_datetime, input_button, counter, and timer helpers

• App management — Install, start, stop, restart, uninstall, and configure apps (add-ons)

• Entity & service control — Query states, call services, render templates, browse entity/device/area registries

• System tools — System info, config validation, backups, core restart, error log

• Event & calendar tools — List event types, fire events, calendar queries

• State management — Set, delete entity states; handle intents

66 tools across 5 categories, using three HA transport layers: REST API, WebSocket API, and SSH/SFTP.

Prerequisites

• Home Assistant OS (or any HA installation with Supervisor)

• Long-lived access token — Create one in HA → Profile → Security → Long-Lived Access Tokens

• Node.js 20+

• (Optional) SSH app — Required only for file management tools. Install "Advanced SSH & Web Terminal" from the app store.

Quick Start

No installation needed — your MCP client runs the server automatically via npx. Just add the configuration to your client and you're ready to go.

Configuration

The server is configured through environment variables set in your MCP client's configuration file. The client injects these into the server process at launch time — you never need to set system-wide environment variables.

Required Variables

Optional Variables (for file management)

File management tools require SSH access. See Setting Up SSH below.

Getting a Long-Lived Access Token

1. Open your Home Assistant UI

2. Click your profile icon (bottom-left)

3. Scroll to Long-Lived Access Tokens under the Security tab

4. Click Create Token, give it a name, and copy the token

MCP Client Setup

Choose the setup for your MCP client below. In each case, add the configuration and the client will automatically download and run the server via npx.

Tip: You can omit the HA_SSH_* variables if you don't need file management tools. The server will start without SFTP and only fail if you try to use a file tool.

VS Code (GitHub Copilot)

Option A: Install the extension (recommended)

The easiest way — install the Home Assistant MCP Server extension from the VS Code Marketplace. It registers the MCP server automatically and stores your credentials securely.

1. Install the extension from the Marketplace (or search "Home Assistant MCP Server" in the Extensions view).

2. Set your Home Assistant URL in Settings → homeAssistantMcp.url.

3. Run "Home Assistant MCP: Set Access Token" from the Command Palette (Ctrl+Shift+P).

4. The MCP server appears in Copilot Chat automatically.

For file management, configure the SSH settings (homeAssistantMcp.ssh.*) and optionally run "Home Assistant MCP: Set SSH Password".

Option B: One-click install via mcp.json

Click the badge at the top of this README, or use the link below. VS Code will prompt you for your Home Assistant URL and access token.

Option C: Manual mcp.json setup

Create .vscode/mcp.json in your workspace (or add to your User Settings for global access):

{
  "inputs": [
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "ha-url",
      "description": "Home Assistant base URL (e.g. http://homeassistant.local:8123)"
    },
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "ha-token",
      "description": "Home Assistant long-lived access token",
      "password": true
    }
  ],
  "servers": {
    "home-assistant": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@jarahkon/hass-mcp-server@latest"],
      "env": {
        "HA_URL": "${input:ha-url}",
        "HA_TOKEN": "${input:ha-token}"
      }
    }
  }
}

With SSH (for file management tools):

{
  "inputs": [
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "ha-url",
      "description": "Home Assistant base URL (e.g. http://homeassistant.local:8123)"
    },
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "ha-token",
      "description": "Home Assistant long-lived access token",
      "password": true
    }
  ],
  "servers": {
    "home-assistant": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@jarahkon/hass-mcp-server@latest"],
      "env": {
        "HA_URL": "${input:ha-url}",
        "HA_TOKEN": "${input:ha-token}",
        "HA_SSH_HOST": "homeassistant.local",
        "HA_SSH_USER": "root",
        "HA_SSH_KEY_PATH": "/home/you/.ssh/ha_ed25519"
      }
    }
  }
}

Claude Desktop

Edit the Claude Desktop config file:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "home-assistant": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@jarahkon/hass-mcp-server@latest"],
      "env": {
        "HA_URL": "http://homeassistant.local:8123",
        "HA_TOKEN": "your_long_lived_access_token_here"
      }
    }
  }
}

Cursor

Edit ~/.cursor/mcp.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "home-assistant": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@jarahkon/hass-mcp-server@latest"],
      "env": {
        "HA_URL": "http://homeassistant.local:8123",
        "HA_TOKEN": "your_long_lived_access_token_here"
      }
    }
  }
}

Other MCP Clients

Any MCP client that supports stdio servers will work. Use npx as the command with -y @jarahkon/hass-mcp-server@latest as args, and pass HA_URL and HA_TOKEN in the env block.

Setting Up SSH (for file management)

File management tools (ha_upload_file, ha_read_file, ha_list_files, etc.) require SSH access to your Home Assistant instance.

1. Install the SSH app in Home Assistant

1. In HA, go to Settings → Apps → App Store

2. Install Advanced SSH & Web Terminal

3. In the app configuration, set the username to root (required for SFTP) and enable sftp: true

4. Configure authentication — either set a password or add your public key to authorized_keys (recommended)

5. Start the app and check the logs to confirm it started successfully

2. Generate an SSH key (recommended)

Key-based authentication is more secure than passwords.

# Generate a key pair (leave passphrase empty for automated use)
ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -f ~/.ssh/ha_ed25519 -C "ha-mcp-server"

This creates ~/.ssh/ha_ed25519 (private key) and ~/.ssh/ha_ed25519.pub (public key).

Add the public key contents to the app configuration in HA:

ssh:
  username: root
  password: ""
  authorized_keys:
    - "ssh-ed25519 AAAA...contents of ha_ed25519.pub..."
  sftp: true

3. Add SSH variables to your MCP client config

Add these environment variables alongside HA_URL and HA_TOKEN in the env block of your MCP client configuration:

"HA_SSH_HOST": "homeassistant.local",
"HA_SSH_USER": "root",
"HA_SSH_KEY_PATH": "/home/you/.ssh/ha_ed25519"

Or if using password authentication:

"HA_SSH_HOST": "homeassistant.local",
"HA_SSH_USER": "root",
"HA_SSH_PASSWORD": "your_ssh_password_here"

SSH key path examples

Tool Reference

Dashboards (6 tools)

Files (7 tools) — requires SSH

Automations, Scripts, Scenes & Helpers (17 tools)

Apps & System (18 tools)

Entities & Services (18 tools)

Architecture

The server uses three transport layers to communicate with Home Assistant:

src/
├── index.ts              # MCP server entry point, registers all tools
├── config.ts             # Environment variable parsing and validation
├── ha/
│   ├── rest-client.ts    # REST API client with auth header
│   ├── ws-client.ts      # WebSocket client with auto-reconnect
│   └── sftp-client.ts    # SFTP client with path safety checks
└── tools/
    ├── dashboards.ts     # 6 dashboard tools
    ├── files.ts          # 7 file management tools
    ├── automations.ts    # 17 automation/script/scene/helper tools
    ├── addons.ts         # 18 app and system tools
    └── entities.ts       # 18 entity and service tools

vscode-extension/         # VS Code Marketplace extension wrapper
└── src/
    └── extension.ts      # Registers MCP server via mcpServerDefinitionProviders API

Security Notes

• SFTP path restrictions: Read operations are allowed anywhere under /config/. Write and delete operations are restricted to safe subdirectories (www/, custom_components/, themes/, blueprints/, scripts/, automations/) and specific files (configuration.yaml, automations.yaml, scripts.yaml, scenes.yaml). Write operations to system directories like deps/ or .storage/ are blocked.

• Token security: Never commit your .env file. The .gitignore already excludes it.

• SSH authentication: Prefer SSH key-based auth (HA_SSH_KEY_PATH) over passwords. Never commit private keys or passwords to source control.

License

MIT