Smart Home Add-on Types
Your smart home add-on type reflects the capabilities of your device. You implement the smart home interfaces in your add-on for the features that your device supports. Most add-ons implement multiple interfaces to enable voice interaction for multiple features. Some add-ons use the interfaces available to many kinds of devices, and some add-ons use interfaces specific to their device type.
Choose the interfaces for your device type
Usually you choose the most specific interface available to model components of your devices, because the more specific the interface, the more natural the utterances are for your user. For example, the user has a smart thermostat, named bedroom thermostat in the Alexa app. If you model the thermostat with the Alexa.ModeController interface, the utterance is "Alexa, set the Thermostat Mode on the Bedroom Thermostat to automatic." If you model the thermostat with the Alexa.ThermostatController interface, the utterance is "Alexa, set the Bedroom Thermostat to automatic.".
For recommendations about what interfaces to implement for common device types, see Smart Home Device Templates.
Interfaces for any device type
Implement the Smart Home APIs appropriate to control your smart home device. Return all supported capabilities in your discovery response.
Interfaces for specific device types
If you want to build a smart home add-on for a specific category of devices, review the following topics:
- Smart Home Cooking Add-ons – Add-ons that control smart home kitchen and cooking appliances.
- Smart Home Energy Add-ons – Add-ons for devices that report energy usage and manage automation of devices that consume energy.
- Smart Home Entertainment Add-ons – Add-ons that control smart home entertainment and audio visual devices.
- Smart Home Security Add-ons – Add-ons that control smart home security devices such as cameras, locks, motion sensors.
- Multi-capability Skills – Skills that supports native smart home and custom voice interaction models.
Related topics
- List of Alexa Interfaces and Supported Languages
- Smart Home API Reference
- Smart Home Add-on Concepts
Last updated: Dec 22, 2025
