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Table of Contents

• Intro
• Includes in same folder
• Includes in sub-folder
• Includes in merged folder

Intro

If you are getting started with Home Assistant, you may notice the configuration.yaml file growing long and difficult to manage. I’m going to show you three ways I split my configuration.yaml file into other yaml files to make my configuration more organized.

The Home Assistant website has a great page on how to split your configuration. I’ll be covering a more detailed how-to in this article.

The example configuration I use in this article (including the Alarm Clock) was created here.

Includes in same folder

We’ll separate some code from configuration.yaml into another yaml file in the same /homeassistant/ folder. In this example, I’ll move the code in the group: section, but it works for other sections in the configuration.yaml.

I start with this section of code:

group:
# Alarm clock
  alarm_clock:
    name: 'Alarm Clock'
    entities:
      - sensor.alarm_clock_time
      - input_slider.alarm_clock_hour
      - input_slider.alarm_clock_minute
      - input_boolean.alarm_clock_status

Step 1: Create a new groups.yaml file with all the code after the header:

## Alarm clock

  alarm_clock:
    name: 'Alarm Clock'
    entities:
      - sensor.alarm_clock_time
      - input_slider.alarm_clock_hour
      - input_slider.alarm_clock_minute
      - input_boolean.alarm_clock_status

Note: I added a comment at the top so I can easily tell the purpose of the file.

Step 2: Add !include groups.yaml to the groups section header like this:

group: !include groups.yaml

That’s it!

Includes in sub-folder

If you split each section in the configuration, there would be a lot of yaml files in one folder! Fortunately, it’s easy to organize with sub-folders in Home Assistant.

To place the yaml code in a sub-folder, all you have to do is:

Step 1: Move the groups.yaml file into a sub-folder within the /homeassistant/ folder

Step 2: Add the folder name to the include code. The line in configuration.yaml should read:

group: !include include/groups.yaml

Includes in merged folder

When your configuration gets very complex, it can be helpful to further split the yaml files. I’ll use the sensor: section as an example.

I started with this code:

Sensor:
  - platform: yr
  - platform: time_date
    display_options:
      - 'time'
  - platform: template
    sensors:
      alarm_clock_hour:
        value_template: '{{ states.input_slider.alarm_clock_hour.state | int }}'
      alarm_clock_minute:
        value_template: '{{ states.input_slider.alarm_clock_minute.state | int }}'
      alarm_clock_time:
        value_template: >-
          {{ states.sensor.alarm_clock_hour.state }}:
          {%- if states.sensor.alarm_clock_minute.state|length == 1 -%}
            0
          {%- endif -%}
            {{ states.sensor.alarm_clock_minute.state }}
      alarm_clock_time_long:
        value_template: >-
          {% if states.sensor.alarm_clock_hour.state|length == 1 -%}
            0
          {%- endif -%}
            {{ states.sensor.alarm_clock_hour.state }}:
          {%- if states.sensor.alarm_clock_minute.state|length == 1 -%}
            0
          {%- endif -%}
            {{ states.sensor.alarm_clock_minute.state }}

Step 1: Create a new folder in the /homeassistant/ folder. For this example, I’ll use a folder named sensor.

Step 2: Add the code to include as yaml files in the new folder. Name the yaml files anything you want; Home Assistant only needs the folder name.

I’ll create weather.yaml for the sensor related to a weather forecast:

## Weather sensor

  - platform: yr

The rest of the code is for an alarm clock. I’ll add it to its own alarm-clock.yaml file:

## Alarm clock sensor

  - platform: time_date
    display_options:
      - 'time'
  - platform: template
    sensors:
      alarm_clock_hour:
        value_template: '{{ states.input_slider.alarm_clock_hour.state | int }}'
      alarm_clock_minute:
        value_template: '{{ states.input_slider.alarm_clock_minute.state | int }}'
      alarm_clock_time:
        value_template: >-
          {{ states.sensor.alarm_clock_hour.state }}:
          {%- if states.sensor.alarm_clock_minute.state|length == 1 -%}
            0
          {%- endif -%}
            {{ states.sensor.alarm_clock_minute.state }}
      alarm_clock_time_long:
        value_template: >-
          {% if states.sensor.alarm_clock_hour.state|length == 1 -%}
            0
          {%- endif -%}
            {{ states.sensor.alarm_clock_hour.state }}:
          {%- if states.sensor.alarm_clock_minute.state|length == 1 -%}
            0
          {%- endif -%}
            {{ states.sensor.alarm_clock_minute.state }}

Step 3: Add the following code to configuration.yaml file.

sensor: !include_dir_merge_list sensor/

Note: the sensor code is a ‘list’ because the code in each include begins with a dash (-). If you are including code that does not begin with a dash, use the word named (i.e.,!include_dir_merge_named). The configuration: section is not a “list” for example.

I hope this helps!

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