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The original was posted on /r/homeassistant by /u/msapple on 2026-06-06 00:01:14+00:00.
I built a HACS integration that lets you use any IR remote as a Home Assistant automation trigger — no MQTT, no custom code
Home Assistant 2026.6 quietly introduced a new infrared entity platform, and as far as I can tell this is the first integration outside of the official LG one to actually use it.
I've been using a SideClick remote attached to my Apple TV to trigger Hue light scenes in Home Assistant for about a year now. The setup worked, but it was a mess — ESPHome flashed to an IR receiver, MQTT bridging signals into HA, and a pile of custom automation logic just to map button presses to scenes. Every time something broke I had to dig back into the whole stack.
With 2026.6's new infrared platform I was able to build a proper HACS integration that replaces all of that. You point your remote at an ESPHome IR receiver, hit "Add button" in the HA UI, press the button twice to confirm, give it a name, and that's it — HA fires an event entity you can use as an automation trigger. No MQTT, no custom code, no manual fingerprinting.
It also handles double-click detection, has a manual code entry path if you already have a command map, and includes tuned ESPHome configs for both ESP32 and ESP8266.
Still early (v0.4.0, I'm the only tester so far) but it's been working reliably for me. Would love feedback from anyone else running IR remotes with HA.
GitHub: https://github.com/dhruvb14/hacs
Sideclick Inside HomeAssistant
