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url: /home-assistant/import.md
---

# Import from Home Assistant

The **Home Assistant plugin** brings Home Assistant's own sensors and controls into camera.ui. It is the reverse of the [integration](/home-assistant/integration): Home Assistant devices come into camera.ui, where you can assign them to cameras and use them as detection triggers.

## Setup

Install and enable the **Home Assistant** plugin from the [Plugins](/plugins/) page, then open its settings:

* **Home Assistant URL.** The address of your Home Assistant, for example `http://homeassistant.local:8123`.
* **Access Token.** A long-lived access token from your Home Assistant profile, under **Security**.

Running camera.ui as the [Home Assistant app](/home-assistant/app)? Leave both empty. The plugin connects to Home Assistant on its own, no token needed.

## What you can import

The plugin offers every Home Assistant entity it can map, under **Discovered** on the [Sensors page](/sensors/setup#the-sensors-page), with its name, entity id, type and room. Nothing comes over until you pick it.

* **Sensors.** Motion, occupancy, contact, doorbell, smoke, leak, gas, carbon monoxide, and other supported types become camera.ui [sensors](/sensors/).
* **Controls.** Locks, garage doors, alarm panels, switches, lights, and sirens come in as controls. Operating one in camera.ui operates it in Home Assistant.

Unsupported entity types never show up. To keep specific entities out of the offer as well, list them under **Excluded Entities**.

## Using imported sensors

Adopted sensors show up in the [Sensors](/sensors/) view like any other. Assigned to a camera, one works as a detection trigger like a native sensor: a Home Assistant motion detector or door contact can start a camera event. Imported controls appear in the camera's Overview and in [automations](/automations/). On the [Sensors page](/sensors/setup#the-sensors-page) each imported sensor shows its Home Assistant entity id as its **ID**, to tell apart entities with the same friendly name and to search by. The entity id is only a label: camera.ui identifies the entity by its registry id, so renaming it in Home Assistant keeps the sensor and its assignments. If you delete the entity in Home Assistant, the sensor stays and is marked as removed until you delete it here too; if Home Assistant is down, it just shows as unavailable.

Adopted entities are remembered by camera.ui, not by the plugin, so they survive restarts of both.

## Running the integration too

You can import from Home Assistant and run the [integration](/home-assistant/integration) at the same time. The plugin never re-imports the cameras and sensors that camera.ui itself exports to Home Assistant.

**Imported sensors are never sent back.** A sensor pulled in from Home Assistant is never exported to Home Assistant again, not by this plugin and not by the [integration](/home-assistant/integration), even if you export it to another bridge like HomeKit.