Home Assistant CLI

Control your Home Assistant smart home devices using the official hass-cli tool — a feature-rich command-line interface with auto-completion, event monitoring, and flexible output formatting.

Why This Skill vs.

homeassistant

(curl-based)?

Choose

homeassistant-cli

if you want:

✅ Auto-completion for entity IDs and services (bash/zsh/fish)
✅ Event monitoring in real-time (
```
hass-cli event watch
```
)
✅ History queries (
```
hass-cli state history
```
)
✅ Better output formatting (table/YAML/JSON with one flag)
✅ Interactive exploration (easier to discover entities and services)
✅ Comprehensive documentation with examples and troubleshooting

Choose

homeassistant

(curl) if you want:

✅ Zero dependencies (curl + jq are pre-installed)
✅ Lightweight and fast
✅ Better for scripting and automation
✅ No Python requirements

Both work great — this skill is for users who interact frequently with Home Assistant and want a richer CLI experience.

Setup

Before using hass-cli, configure authentication:

Generate a long-lived access token in Home Assistant:
- Navigate to your profile:
```
https://your-homeassistant:8123/profile
```
- Scroll to "Long-Lived Access Tokens"
- Create a new token

Set environment variables (add to shell config for persistence):

export HASS_SERVER=https://homeassistant.local:8123
export HASS_TOKEN=<your-token>

Test connection:
```
hass-cli info
```

Common Commands

List Entities

# List all entities
hass-cli state list
Filter by domain
hass-cli state list light
hass-cli state list switch
hass-cli state list sensor
Get specific entity state

hass-cli state get light.living_room

Control Devices

# Turn on/off lights
hass-cli service call light.turn_on --arguments entity_id=light.living_room
hass-cli service call light.turn_off --arguments entity_id=light.living_room
Set brightness (0-255)
hass-cli service call light.turn_on --arguments entity_id=light.bedroom,brightness=128
Turn on/off switches
hass-cli service call switch.turn_on --arguments entity_id=switch.fan
hass-cli service call switch.turn_off --arguments entity_id=switch.fan
Toggle any device

hass-cli service call homeassistant.toggle --arguments entity_id=light.kitchen

List and Call Services

# List all services
hass-cli service list
Filter services
hass-cli service list light
hass-cli service list 'home.*toggle'
Get service details (YAML output)

hass-cli -o yaml service list homeassistant.toggle

Work with Scenes

# List scenes
hass-cli state list scene
Activate a scene

hass-cli service call scene.turn_on --arguments entity_id=scene.movie_time

Monitor Events

# Watch all events
hass-cli event watch
Watch specific event type

hass-cli event watch state_changed
hass-cli event watch automation_triggered

History

# Get state history (last 50 minutes)
hass-cli state history --since 50m light.living_room
Multiple entities

hass-cli state history --since 1h light.living_room switch.fan

Output Formats

Control output with

-o

--output

# Table (default)
hass-cli state list
YAML
hass-cli -o yaml state get light.living_room
JSON
hass-cli -o json state list light
No headers (for scripting)

hass-cli --no-headers state list

Tips

Entity discovery: Use
```
hass-cli state list
```
to find entity IDs
Service discovery: Use
```
hass-cli service list
```
to find available services
Auto-completion: See references/autocomplete.md for shell setup
Troubleshooting: See references/troubleshooting.md

Examples

See references/examples.md for common automation patterns and use cases.

Home Assistant CLI

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