Homelable

Homelable is a self-hosted infrastructure visualization solution. It provides a network/zigbee scanning feature to accelerate the identification of machines, devices and services deployed on your local infrastructure.

Homelable also offers a healthcheck system through multiple methods (ping/TCP, /health API, etc.) to get a global overview of online/offline services.

You can also select some pre-built design styles, or personalize each device in your diagram.

If you just like the design, you can only run the frontend and export your design as PNG.

If you are running Homeassistant, check the Homelable HA version (via HACS)

Screenshots

Installation

Docker, Proxmox LXC, build from source, configuration, and development setup are all covered in INSTALLATION.md.

Network Scanner

The scanner runs nmap -sV --open on your configured CIDR ranges and populates a Pending Devices queue. From the sidebar you can then approve (adds a node to the canvas), hide, or ignore each discovered device.

Triggering a scan

To save you time when mapping your infrastructure, Homlable can scan your network and report all the services it detects. It can also identify them, saving you even more time. Click Scan Network in the sidebar. The Scan History tab opens automatically and refreshes every 3 seconds until the scan completes.

Deep scan (custom ports)

By default the scanner only probes nmap's standard port set. To fingerprint services on non-standard ports, enable the deep scan via .env (all options are overridable per-scan from the scan dialog):

# JSON array of port specs — each entry is a single port "N" or an inclusive
# range "N-M" (1–65535, N <= M). These are ports, not CIDRs or bare integers.
SCANNER_HTTP_RANGES=["8080","9000-9100"]
SCANNER_HTTP_PROBE_ENABLED=true   # send an HTTP probe to those ports for service ID
SCANNER_HTTP_VERIFY_TLS=false     # verify TLS certs on the HTTP probe

The listed ports are appended to nmap's -p spec. Invalid entries (out-of-range, malformed, or reversed ranges) are silently skipped.

macOS / root privileges

Some nmap scan types (SYN scan, OS detection) require root. If the scan fails with a permissions error, run it manually with sudo using the included script:

cd backend
sudo python ../scripts/run_scan.py 192.168.1.0/24

# Multiple ranges:
sudo python ../scripts/run_scan.py 192.168.1.0/24 10.0.0.0/24

Results are written directly to the database and appear as Pending Devices in the UI without restarting the backend.

On Linux the backend process itself can be given the NET_RAW capability instead of running as root: bash sudo setcap cap_net_raw+ep $(which nmap)

Node Check Methods

Homelable continuously monitors your nodes and displays their live status (online / offline / unknown) directly on the canvas. Each node can be configured with an independent check method suited to the service it runs.

Zigbee2MQTT Import

Homelable can connect directly to your MQTT broker and import your Zigbee network topology from Zigbee2MQTT, placing each device on the canvas as a typed node.

Prerequisites

• A running MQTT broker (e.g. Mosquitto) accessible from the Homelable host
• Zigbee2MQTT connected to the broker with at least one device paired

Usage

1. Click Zigbee Import in the left sidebar (below "Scan Network")
2. Enter your broker host, port (default 1883), optional credentials, and base topic (default zigbee2mqtt)
3. Click Test Connection to verify reachability, then Fetch Devices
4. Select the devices you want from the grouped list (Coordinator / Router / End Device)
5. Click Add N to Canvas — devices are placed in a grid with IoT edges

Node Types

Hierarchy is set automatically: coordinator → routers → end devices (parent_id). LQI (Link Quality Indicator) is stored as a node property.

Full documentation: docs/zigbee-import.md

Z-Wave Import

Homelable can also import your Z-Wave network from Z-Wave JS UI (formerly zwavejs2mqtt) over the same MQTT broker, dropping each node on the canvas as a typed node.

Prerequisites

• A running MQTT broker (e.g. Mosquitto) accessible from the Homelable host
• Z-Wave JS UI connected to the broker with its MQTT gateway enabled and at least one node included

Usage

1. Click Z-Wave Import in the left sidebar (below "Zigbee Import")
2. Enter your broker host, port (default 1883), optional credentials, MQTT prefix (default zwave), and gateway name (default zwavejs2mqtt)
3. Click Test Connection to verify reachability
4. Choose a target — Pending section or Canvas directly — then Import to Pending / Fetch Devices
5. Select the devices you want from the grouped list (Controller / Router / End Device) and click Add N to Canvas

Node Types

Hierarchy is set automatically: controller → routers → end devices (parent_id), derived from each node's neighbor list. Z-Wave has no LQI, so that property is omitted.

Full documentation: docs/zwave-import.md

Live View (read-only public canvas)

Live View lets you share a read-only snapshot of your canvas with anyone on your network — no login required. It is disabled by default.

Activation

Add LIVEVIEW_KEY to your .env:

LIVEVIEW_KEY=your-secret-key

Then restart the backend:

docker compose restart backend

Usage

Use this URL to view your canvas:

http:///view?key=your-secret-key

The page shows your canvas in pan/zoom-only mode — no editing, no credentials needed. Clicking a node that has an IP opens it in a new tab.

Gethomepage Widget (read-only stats)

Homelable can expose a small JSON stats endpoint that gethomepage consumes through its built-in customapi widget. Disabled by default.

Activation

Add HOMEPAGE_API_KEY to your .env:

HOMEPAGE_API_KEY=your-secret-key

Restart the backend (docker compose restart backend).

Endpoint

GET /api/v1/stats/summary — requires header X-API-Key: your-secret-key. Returns:

{
  "nodes": 12,
  "online": 9,
  "offline": 2,
  "unknown": 1,
  "pending_devices": 3,
  "zigbee_devices": 5,
  "last_scan_at": "2026-05-14T10:00:00+00:00"
}

gethomepage services.yaml snippet

- Homelab:
    - Homelable:
        icon: mdi-lan
        href: http://homelable.local:3000
        widget:
          type: customapi
          url: http://homelable.local:8000/api/v1/stats/summary
          method: GET
          headers:
            X-API-Key: your-secret-key
          mappings:
            - field: nodes           ; label: Nodes
            - field: online          ; label: Online
            - field: offline         ; label: Offline
            - field: pending_devices ; label: Pending
            - field: zigbee_devices  ; label: Zigbee
            - field: last_scan_at    ; label: Last scan

The backend port (8000) must be reachable from your gethomepage container.

MCP Server (AI Integration) (optional)

Homelable can exposes a Model Context Protocol server so any MCP-compatible AI client (Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Open WebUI…) can read your homelab topology and act on it.

What the AI can do

Setup

1. Add the keys to your .env:

# Authenticates AI clients (Claude Code, etc.) → MCP server
MCP_API_KEY=mcp_sk_changeme

# Authenticates MCP server → backend (internal Docker network only, never exposed)
MCP_SERVICE_KEY=svc_changeme

# Generate both with:
# python3 -c "import secrets; print(secrets.token_hex(32))"

No plain-text passwords involved — AUTH_PASSWORD_HASH is only used for the web UI login.

2. Start the MCP service:

docker compose up -d mcp
# MCP server is now listening on http://<your-homelab-ip>:8001

Proxmox LXC / bare-metal (no Docker): create the LXC via community-scripts/ProxmoxVE (or any Debian/Ubuntu LXC), then inside it run sudo bash scripts/lxc-mcp-install.sh. Installs a homelable-mcp systemd service, prompts for MCP_API_KEY / MCP_SERVICE_KEY (auto-generated if you press Enter), and skips prompts if mcp/.env already exists.

3. Configure your AI client:

Claude Code — run this command in your terminal:

claude mcp add --transport sse homelable http://<your-homelab-ip>:8001/mcp \
  --header "X-API-Key: mcp_sk_yourkey"

Or add it manually to ~/.claude.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "homelable": {
      "type": "sse",
      "url": "http://<your-homelab-ip>:8001/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "X-API-Key": "mcp_sk_yourkey"
      }
    }
  }
}

Claude Desktop — edit ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json (macOS) or %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json (Windows):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "homelable": {
      "type": "sse",
      "url": "http://<your-homelab-ip>:8001/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "X-API-Key": "mcp_sk_yourkey"
      }
    }
  }
}

Example prompts

• "What nodes are currently offline?"
• "Add a new LXC container named pihole at 192.168.1.5, connected to my switch."
• "Trigger a network scan on 192.168.1.0/24 and show me the pending devices."
• "Show me the full canvas topology."

Security

• The MCP server is not intended to be exposed to the internet — keep port 8001 firewalled to your LAN.
• Rotate the key any time by updating MCP_API_KEY in .env and restarting: docker compose restart mcp.
• The MCP server communicates with the backend over the internal Docker network — the backend API is never directly exposed to MCP clients.