Button Card vs ThingsBoard
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted home automation options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Button Card
Highly customizable button card for Home Assistant Lovelace
VS
ThingsBoard
Open-source IoT platform for device management and data
| Feature | Button Card | ThingsBoard |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Home Automation | Home Automation |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Language | TypeScript | Java |
| Setup difficulty | Easy | Hard |
| Min. RAM | 32 MB | 2,048 MB |
| Deployment | source | docker, kubernetes, bare-metal |
| GitHub stars | ★ 2,476 | ★ 22,200 |
| First released | 2019 | 2017 |
| Replaces | proprietary smart home dashboards | AWS IoT, Azure IoT |
Why pick each one
Choose Button Card if…
- Released under the MIT license
- Easy to set up — beginner-friendly
- Active community (2.5k GitHub stars)
- Written in TypeScript
Frequently asked questions
Is Button Card or ThingsBoard better?
Neither is universally better. ThingsBoard has the larger community, while Button Card is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Button Card and ThingsBoard free and open-source?
Yes. Button Card is licensed under MIT and ThingsBoard under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Button Card and ThingsBoard with Docker?
Button Card: check the project docs for container support. ThingsBoard: yes.