Home Assistant on Synology vs Unraid vs TrueNAS

If you already own a NAS, running Home Assistant on it is tempting: one box, always on, one place to manage. Synology, Unraid, and TrueNAS can all host Home Assistant, but the experience differs in one decision that matters more than the rest - can you run full Home Assistant OS in a VM, or are you stuck with the Container install? That choice determines whether you get the add-on store. This guide keeps that distinction front and center.

If you want the full Home Assistant experience with add-ons, run HAOS in a VM, which makes Unraid or TrueNAS (or a ”+“-series Synology with VMM) the natural choices. If you’re happy managing your own supporting containers, the Container install runs anywhere.

The one tradeoff that drives everything: Container vs HAOS-in-a-VM

Home Assistant has a few install types. On a NAS, two are relevant:

• Home Assistant Container - the official Docker image (ghcr.io/home-assistant/home-assistant). It runs Home Assistant core and all integrations, but it has no Supervisor, which means no add-on store. Add-ons (Mosquitto, ESPHome, Zigbee2MQTT, the Tailscale/cloudflared add-ons, etc.) are one-click Docker services managed by the Supervisor - and they simply aren’t available here. You can still run those same services as your own separate containers; you just manage them yourself.
• Home Assistant OS (HAOS) in a virtual machine - this gives you the full, supported experience including the add-on store, because the Supervisor comes along for the ride. On a NAS this means running the HAOS disk image inside the platform’s hypervisor.

(Note: the older “Supervised” install-on-your-own-OS method was deprecated on May 22, 2025 and has been unsupported since release 2025.12, so on a NAS your realistic choices are Container or HAOS-in-a-VM.)

So the platform question really becomes: how easily can each NAS run a VM?

Synology

Synology is the most polished and beginner-friendly NAS OS. Since DSM 7.2, Docker is provided through Container Manager, the package that replaced the old Docker one and added a Compose UI, so the Home Assistant Container install is straightforward on most models. On DSM 7.0 and 7.1 you are still looking for the package called Docker.

For the full add-on experience you need Virtual Machine Manager (VMM) to run HAOS in a VM. VMM is available on Synology’s Intel/AMD ”+” models - the 2025 DS225+/DS425+/DS925+ class as well as older units like the DS224+/DS923+ - and not on the lower-end ARM units, so check your specific model before counting on it. Synology also requires more than 2 GB of memory before a virtual machine will run at all, and VM data can only be stored on a Btrfs volume. Where VMM is available, importing the HAOS image as a VM works and is a common setup.

Tradeoffs: Synology’s strength is stability and simplicity; its weakness is that you’re working within DSM’s constraints, and lower-tier models lack the CPU/VM support for the HAOS-VM route. The USB radio question is the one to check carefully, and it cuts the opposite way from what you might guess: DSM 7 does not ship the USB-serial kernel modules that most Zigbee and Z-Wave sticks depend on (cp210x, ch341, pl2303), so the stick never shows up as a /dev/ttyUSB* device and the Container install simply cannot see the radio until you add community-built driver packages and load the modules at boot. Only sticks that present themselves as USB CDC-ACM are handled natively. Passing that same stick through to a VMM virtual machine sidesteps the problem, because VMM hands the raw USB device to the guest rather than relying on a host serial driver. If your radios live on the NAS, that one detail can settle the Container-versus-VM question for you.

Unraid

Unraid is built for exactly this kind of “do many things on one box” use. It has first-class Docker support (Community Applications makes the Home Assistant Container a couple of clicks) and built-in KVM virtual machines, so running HAOS in a VM - with the full add-on store - is well-trodden territory. Community templates exist for both approaches.

Unraid also tends to handle USB device pass-through to VMs more gracefully, which matters if you’re plugging a Zigbee or Z-Wave coordinator into the server. The cost is that Unraid is a paid product and assumes a bit more comfort with Docker/VM concepts than Synology’s appliance feel.

TrueNAS

TrueNAS is the most “full Linux” of the three, with ZFS, snapshots, and strong storage features. The naming is worth pinning down first: the Linux/Debian-based line was called TrueNAS SCALE until the 25.04 “Fangtooth” release in April 2025 dropped the SCALE suffix and rebranded the free build TrueNAS Community Edition, while the FreeBSD-based TrueNAS CORE moved into maintenance-only status at the same time - so guidance framed as “SCALE vs CORE” predates the current product. It supports virtual machines, and the recommended way to get full-featured Home Assistant here is to run HAOS in a VM - that’s what gets you the add-on store. Container-based deployments exist but, like everywhere else, drop the Supervisor and add-ons.

One version caveat matters more here than on the other two platforms: TrueNAS rebuilt its virtualization layer mid-generation, then partly rebuilt it back. Releases up to 24.10 “Electric Eel” ran VMs on libvirt/KVM; 25.04.0 “Fangtooth” retired that screen in favor of an Incus-based Instances feature; then 25.04.2 (July 2025) reintroduced classic virtualization and split the UI into a Virtual Machines screen (full KVM virtual machines - the one you want for HAOS) and a Containers screen (LXC system containers, which TrueNAS still labels experimental). 25.10 “Goldeye” keeps that split. TrueNAS says virtual machines migrate automatically from 24.10 to 25.04.2 with no manual step, but a VM that passes a Zigbee or Z-Wave stick through is still the configuration to check first - confirm the device is still attached, and the mesh is back, before you trust it again. There is one more trap if you go on to 25.10 or later: a legacy VM that came from the 25.04.0 or 25.04.1 Instances feature keeps working, but it lands on the Containers screen, and VMs there do not autostart. A Home Assistant VM in that state comes back down after every reboot until you migrate its zvol to a VM created on the Virtual Machines screen.

TrueNAS rewards users who want control and don’t mind more setup. It’s the most flexible and the most demanding of technical comfort; ZFS and the VM workflow are powerful but not “appliance simple.”

Integrating local ecosystems (and clearing up some myths)

Whichever platform you pick, a few facts worth getting right:

• HomeKit is exposed by Home Assistant via the built-in HomeKit Bridge integration (to make HA entities show up in Apple Home), and HA can import HomeKit accessories via HomeKit Controller. Neither requires MQTT, and an Apple HomePod/Echo does not run Home Assistant.
• Hubitat integrates with Home Assistant via a community integration (commonly the Hubitat-to-HA bridge) - not via MQTT by default. It’s a separate hub you link to, not something MQTT-bridged out of the box.
• Zigbee and Z-Wave need a USB coordinator/radio plugged into the host, then ZHA/Zigbee2MQTT (Zigbee) or Z-Wave JS (Z-Wave). Good current examples: a Home Assistant Connect ZBT-2 or a ConBee III for Zigbee (the older SkyConnect, renamed the Connect ZBT-1, was discontinued in November 2025 - it still works and still receives software updates, but the ZBT-2 is the one to buy new), and a Zooz 800-series stick (e.g. ZST39) for Z-Wave. Note that something like the Zooz ZAC36 Titan is a Z-Wave water-valve end device, not a coordinator, and the Aeotec Smart Home Hub is a standalone SmartThings-based hub - neither is a USB radio you “run in a container.” Because radios are USB, USB pass-through to your VM/container is the real constraint when picking a platform.

Hardware notes

For a typical home (a few hundred entities), any of these on modest hardware is fine. Give a HAOS VM at least ~2 GB RAM and 2 vCPUs, and put the Home Assistant database on an SSD - recorder write load chews up spinning disks and makes the UI sluggish. If you plan to scale to many hundreds of entities or run heavy add-ons (Frigate NVR, etc.), spec accordingly or consider a dedicated mini-PC (see the best mini PCs for Home Assistant).

Quick verdict

• Synology - easiest day-to-day, great if a ”+” model lets you run the HAOS VM; the Container route works everywhere but loses the add-on store, and on DSM 7 it cannot see a USB Zigbee or Z-Wave radio at all without community serial drivers.
• Unraid - the most balanced for this job: easy Docker and easy HAOS-in-a-VM, with friendlier USB pass-through. Paid, slightly more to learn.
• TrueNAS - most powerful and flexible (ZFS, VMs), best if you want full control and don’t mind setup.

And if remote radios and reliability matter most, a small dedicated HAOS device alongside the NAS is often the least-fuss path of all.