houseplan-card/docs/AUDIT-MARKET.md

Audit — market potential & competitors

Snapshot: 2026-08-05. Star counts via GitHub API the same day. Supersedes the competitor table in PRODUCT.md (2026-07-05) until that file is rewritten. Re-verify numbers before any public claim.

1. Demand shape

Signal	Evidence
Persistent pain	HA Community “Floorplan” category; “100% Floorplan UI” mega-thread (500k+ views historically)
2025–2026 wave	Multiple GUI floorplan projects launched within months (easy-floorplan May 2026, Padraigggs Mar 2026, House Plan Jul 2026, plus older SVG/YAML tools)
Audience	Enthusiasts with wall tablets / panel dashboards — niche but sticky
Adjacent proof	Bubble Card (~4.4k★) shows polished GUI Lovelace cards can go quasi-mainstream; ha-floorplan (~1.6k★) with a hostile workflow shows a demand floor for spatial UIs

Verdict: demand is real. The bottleneck is not “do people want a plan?” — it is “which GUI-first story wins attention before HA core ships something spatial.”

2. Competitive landscape (2026-08-05)

Project	★	Updated	Approach	Overlaps us	Where we still win	Where they win
ha-floorplan	1584	2026-07	Hand SVG + YAML/TS rules	Visualization power	Zero Inkscape/YAML barrier; shared server config	Max customization, mature ecosystem, contributors
easy-floorplan	430	2026-08-04	In-card draw walls/furniture/devices	Direct peer — GUI, no YAML	HA integration + .storage, area-bound rooms, auto devices, vacuums/sun/glow/kiosk, quality-scale CI	Furniture drawing, faster growth, press (DE blogs), simpler “draw a house” story
native picture-elements	built-in	—	% coords in YAML	Overlay icons on image	Editor + zones + shared layout	Zero install, official
native Areas / Home dashboard	built-in	evolving	Grid by area/floor	“At a glance” home	Spatial plan	First-party discoverability
Padraigggs interactive floorplan	42	2026-04	Editor + viewer cards, push to dashboard YAML	GUI editor	Server store, room polygons↔areas, overlays	Polygon light zones, camera animations, YAML export
zigbee-floorplan-card	73	2026-04	LQI over image	LQI overlay	Full product, not single-purpose	Narrow clarity
Dwains / Bubble Card	2k / 4.4k	—	Dashboards / card kits	GUI quality bar	Spatial niche	Distribution, brand
House Plan (us)	21	2026-08-05	Integration + card, room markup, server layout	—	See §3	Traction, HACS default pending

Critical change since PRODUCT.md (2026-07-05)

easy-floorplan was listed at 11★ / immature. One month later it is ≈430★, actively released (v0.8.x), and getting third-party blog coverage. That collapses the old claim that the GUI-floorplan niche is “currently unoccupied.” The niche is now a race, and they are ahead on attention.

House Plan is not the same product: we refuse furniture/wall CAD (SCOPE / ROADMAP non-goal) and instead ship a storage integration, area-linked rooms, multi-client layout, and curated overlays. That moat is real — but only if users find us and understand the difference in one demo GIF.

3. Our moat (still valid)

Nobody else currently combines all of:

1. Server-side config — HA integration, .storage, optimistic expected_rev, live multi-client sync, survives dashboard YAML edits.
2. In-card room polygon editor bound to HA areas → auto device placement.
3. Curated overlays — glow pools, temp/LQI fills, sun wedges, vacuum trails, cover morph, lock invariant.
4. Operational maturity — quality_scale.yaml, 4-layer tests, signed content + SVG CSP, diagnostics/repairs/system_health, dual en/ru docs.

Card-only peers store config in Lovelace YAML (or push into it). That is fine for one admin laptop; it is weaker for family tablets and multi-user homes — exactly our persona split in SCOPE.md.

4. Potential (honest)

Horizon	Realistic outcome	Depends on
Near (HACS default + demo assets)	Low hundreds of ★; Telegram + forum traction	#9004 merge, GIF/video, EN forum/Reddit posts
Medium (12 months of polish + registry depth)	Contender in the GUI-floorplan shortlist; maybe 0.5–1.5k★ if narrative sticks	Differentiation messaging vs easy-floorplan; onboarding magic
Ceiling	Unlikely to dethrone ha-floorplan’s power-user base; unlikely Bubble-scale	Niche size + single maintainer

Usefulness: high for the target personas (admin builds once; household/kiosk use View). Commercialization: none intended (MIT, local-first) — success = installs and unpaid maintenance load.

5. Strategic risks

Risk	Severity	Mitigation
easy-floorplan owns the “no YAML floorplan” mindshare	High	Sharpen README differentiation (server sync, areas, overlays); ship demo GIF now
HA core ships a native spatial plan	High (latent)	Deepen floors/areas registry integration; speed of iteration
HACS default #9004 stuck for months	Medium	Custom-repo path works; social proof before merge
Single-maintainer bus factor	Medium	Docs + tests already strong; avoid feature sprawl
Frontend API churn (hass internals)	Medium	Minimal surface; CI against current HA in harness
Scope creep toward furniture CAD	Self-inflicted	SCOPE non-goals — do not chase easy-floorplan feature-for-feature

6. Positioning recommendation

One sentence: House Plan is the shared, area-aware live map of your Home Assistant home — not a drawing app for furniture.

Lead with: multi-device sync, bind room→area→devices appear, glow/climate/sun/ vacuums, kiosk for wall tablets. Acknowledge: if you want to draw walls and sofas from scratch, use easy-floorplan; if you have a plan image and a real HA registry, use House Plan.

7. Distribution checklist (status)

Lever	State (2026-08-05)
Public demo	Live — https://demo.houseplan.tech (demo/demo)
Dev stand	https://dev.houseplan.tech
Telegram	https://t.me/ha_houseplan
HACS custom install	Works
HACS default	Queued — hacs/default#9004 open since 2026-07-06
Demo GIF / video in README	Still a ROADMAP Phase 10 open item
Forum Floorplan + Reddit posts	Drafts exist off-repo; posting still open
Stars	21 — traction problem, not a product-depth problem

8. What to refresh next

When stars or competitor maturity move materially, update this file first, then sync the table in PRODUCT.md. Do not leave PRODUCT as the only market doc — it already went a month stale while easy-floorplan 40×’d.