If you run Home Assistant, there is a good chance you also run HACS, the Home Assistant Community Store. It is how most of us got the custom cards, themes and integrations that never made it into the main release. For years it has been an add-on to the add-on: you installed it by hand, linked a GitHub account, and hoped nothing broke on the next update.
That is about to change. On October 1, a pull request titled “Add Marketplace integration” was merged into Home Assistant Core. It brings HACS into Home Assistant itself, under the name Marketplace. Matter Alpha and the community forum both have it pencilled in for the 2026.11 release in early November, as long as nothing gets reverted during the beta.
I read through the pull request itself rather than the headlines, because the details are what matter for a system that is already running. Here is what changes, what carries over and what you should check before you update.
What Marketplace is
The short version from the pull request: HACS, moved into Core “with the least effort possible, and as much as possible as it is”. This is a move, not a rewrite. The bigger ideas for a proper store come later.
- It is a system integration, set up by default. You do not add it. Its panel lives under Settings.
- Browsing, installing and updating from the catalogue works without a GitHub account. That alone removes the most annoying step for new users.
- Every download gets an update entity, so custom stuff shows up next to the regular Home Assistant updates.
- A first install of a custom integration no longer needs a restart.
- Each user sees a warning about community content the first time, and nothing installs until it is accepted.
What happens to your existing HACS install
This is the part I would want to know before hitting update on a client’s system. Per the pull request:
- Your HACS install is taken over automatically on first start. Storage, entities, devices, dashboard resources and your custom repositories carry over.
- The HACS integration and its files are removed. Home Assistant’s loader will block the old HACS custom integration and name Marketplace as its replacement.
- The old
/hacsand/hacsfilespaths keep working, so your dashboard cards should not break. - AppDaemon apps and Python scripts are no longer managed. If you used HACS to install those, a repair notice will tell you which ones are affected. They are not deleted, but you will be updating them yourself from now on.
- Custom repositories still work, but they need a GitHub connection, set up from the panel.
Matter Alpha’s write-up adds a fair note: “some capabilities may change”. Read the 2026.11 release notes before updating, not after.
What it does not do
This is the bit I would point out to anyone who thinks “built in” means “checked”. The pull request is refreshingly honest about it.
- Home Assistant does not test, audit or support the community code. The catalogue is the same one HACS has always used. It decides which projects and versions are offered, and which are pulled.
- There are no signatures or checksums on what gets installed.
- An installed integration runs inside Home Assistant with full access, and an installed card runs in the browser of everyone who opens the dashboard. Same as today.
What it does add: every action is admin-only, downloads are confined to their own folders, there are size limits on downloads, and an integration that would replace a built-in one needs an explicit confirmation. That last one is a good guard. A custom integration quietly overriding a core one is the kind of thing that wastes an afternoon of troubleshooting.
What this means in a real install
For a hobbyist, this is pure upside. Fewer steps, no GitHub account, updates in the same place as everything else.
For anyone setting up Home Assistant for someone else, a client or a parent, it cuts both ways. It is now much easier for the homeowner to wander into the store and install a card or integration that nobody vetted. Before Marketplace, the GitHub sign-in was a small speed bump that kept most non-technical people out. That bump is gone. A sensible rule for any system you hand over: the homeowner gets a non-admin account for daily use, and only the admin account can install anything. Marketplace makes every command admin-only, which makes that rule easy to keep.
The other real-world point is the update count. Every custom download now gets its own update entity. If your house runs fifteen custom cards, expect to see more update notices than you are used to. That is a good thing, because stale custom cards are a common reason dashboards break after a core update, but it is worth knowing so it does not look like something went wrong.
Before you update to 2026.11
- Take a full backup first. This is a migration of a config entry, and you want a way back.
- Make a list of what you installed through HACS, especially anything that is an AppDaemon app or a Python script. Those will need a new update path.
- Note your custom repositories. They should carry over, but expect to connect GitHub from the new panel for them.
- If you run a client’s system, wait a point release. Let the .1 and .2 fixes land before you touch a house you are responsible for.
- Read the release notes for anything marked as changed in the Marketplace section.
This is one of those changes that will feel small in six months, the way it feels normal now that Home Assistant has Matter support and its own voice assistant. It does mean the most popular community tool around Home Assistant is now part of the main project, which should help it keep up with core changes. I think that is the right call, as long as everyone remembers that “in the store” still does not mean “checked by Home Assistant”.