Echo Show 15 and Home Assistant in 2026: is it worth it?

Hands-on experience using an Echo Show 15 as a Home Assistant display in 2026.

I have had an Echo Show 15 mounted at home for 3 years now, with the goal of keeping a constant eye on Home Assistant.

After 3 years of use, does it actually work? And more importantly, how?

The limitations I ran into

❌ End of third-party app installs

The biggest disappointment came from an update around mid-2023 / 2024:
it is now impossible to install third-party apps or APKs on the Echo Show 15.

Today, the only way to display Home Assistant on the tablet is via the built-in browser:

1. Say: "Alexa, open Silk"
2. Then open the URL of your Home Assistant instance
3. (Recommended) Add your Home Assistant dashboard to favorites

Auto sleep

Second issue:
the Echo Show 15 (and 21) automatically goes to sleep.

Result:

• the screen turns off
• you have to relaunch the voice command
• reopen Silk
• then click your Home Assistant favorite again

Needless to say, not very practical day to day.

The workaround to avoid sleep mode

Thankfully, there is a simple trick to prevent sleep.

The idea is straightforward:
embed an iframe in your Home Assistant dashboard that simulates activity, so the screen stays on.

Setup

Create a Web Card on your Home Assistant dashboard and use the following URL: