Unshittify: A log of owners reclaiming hardware from dead clouds and lock-in

The hardware still works. The software is in the way. This is a log of people fixing that: TVs with sane home screens, printers talking to modern Macs, appliances brought back after their cloud died, old laptops on a new OS.

Most were built with a coding assistant on top of years of open-source work. Call it undoing enshittification, one device at a time.

browse: tv + displaysmaking + printinghome + appliancesaudio + wearablescomputersclaude code

A public repo means the code exists. Whether it's safe is a separate question. Read the project's current docs before you buy hardware or flash anything.

Dídac Sabatés removed the scale's Wi-Fi so it can't upload to Withings and wrote an ESPHome component that receives each weigh-in over Bluetooth. Readings land in Home Assistant per person, with no cloud and no change to the scale.

Xiaomi changed the humidifier's internal protocol and broke the earlier open firmware. Steffen Vogel wrote a new ESPHome component for its Wi-Fi module, so it runs locally in Home Assistant with no Xiaomi cloud.

Microsoft shut down Xbox Live for the original Xbox in 2010. Insignia runs replacement servers that bring back matchmaking, friends and leaderboards for over 200 games.

Nintendo shut down Nintendo Network in 2024. The Pretendo team builds open replacements for Friends, SpotPass, accounts, Miiverse and per-game matchmaking, for consoles their owners already have.

With its cloud gone, the Foobot was a paperweight. kerosix points its data at a local server through the device's own settings, with no hardware change, and reworked the pollution index, so readings go to a dashboard and Home Assistant with no account.

After Futurehome went bankrupt in 2025, basic hub functions became subscription-only. Adrian Jagielak's add-on runs the hub from Home Assistant instead: discovery, state, control, pairing and house modes, free and local.

Vector's voice features depended on its maker's servers and a fee. kercre123's wire-pod runs that server on the owner's own machine, so voice commands work again with no subscription.

The Toniebox reports to Boxine's cloud. The community's teddyCloud is a local replacement: owners decide what reaches the maker, and can play their own audio from a home server on the figurines.

WHOOP's band works only with a paid subscription. OpenStrap reverse engineered its Bluetooth protocol and built an open app for Android and iOS: sleep, recovery, strain, heart rate and workouts, computed on the phone, with no data leaving it unless you opt in.

The fitness mirror lost its service. TimStewartJ installs a new home launcher over ADB, no hardware change: clock, weather and photo dashboards, Home Assistant pages, media playback, casting and phone-based controls.

A community project replaces Xteink's stock firmware with an open one: full EPUB rendering, KOReader progress sync, Calibre and OPDS libraries, custom fonts, Bluetooth page turners and over-the-air updates.

Tidbyt displays depend on the maker's servers. The Tronbyt community built a self-hosted server and firmware, so the displays run fully locally, keep working if Tidbyt's servers go away, and can use apps Tidbyt had blocked.

The Q11's MotoSync app and cloud stopped working after Minim lost the Motorola licence. ramirezjhulian7 turned each unit into a self-managed router with a local web panel served by the router itself: Wi-Fi settings, adding nodes, device controls and recovery after a reset.

Embodied's cloud went dark in early 2025 and the US$800 robot stopped working. jbeghtol's local hub runs on a PC, Mac or Raspberry Pi and brings back daily missions, reading, workouts, schedules and custom conversations through a web console.

The Pod depends on Eight Sleep's cloud and a paid subscription. Free Sleep installs a small server on the Pod's own Linux, so temperature, schedules, alarms and settings run from a local web app, and the Pod keeps working without internet.

Weber shut down the June app and cloud on 22 September 2026. A volunteer group of June owners built a small replacement server that runs on the oven itself, so preheat, temperature control, timers, cook programs and the live camera work again on the home network.

Belkin shut down Wemo's cloud on 31 January 2026, and devices can no longer be set up through the Wemo app. Binary Boots' free app finds Wemo devices on the local network, switches and dims them, reads Insight energy use and can set them up on Wi-Fi again.

Humane shut the Pin's servers down in February 2025 and the device stopped working. Adam Gastineau's SDK lets it run as a mostly normal Android device, with an assistant app that can use local, self-hosted or remote AI models.

In 2023 Chamberlain blocked third-party access to myQ, breaking Home Assistant and Homebridge control. Paul Wieland's ratgdo board restores local control with full status over MQTT, ESPHome or HomeKit. No cloud and no subscription; the myQ app can keep running.

Spotify ended Car Thing service in December 2024 and told owners to throw them away. Riprod's DeskThing turns it into a desk controller with community apps for music control, weather, Discord call status, clocks and remappable buttons.

Vorwerk began shutting Neato's cloud in October 2025, taking away app control, schedules and maps. Vacuula is a self-hosted replacement server with an installer that points the robot at it: maps, schedules, zones and no-go lines work again.

Google ended support for the first two Nest generations on 25 October 2025: the apps, remote control and voice control stopped, leaving manual thermostats. Cody Kociemba's firmware points them at a new server, self-hosted or his, with remote control, schedules and a web dashboard.

open repo ↗ 9to5googlesett (hardware route)

The fridge was only controllable from its vendor app. Tom's integration brings temperature, power, turbo, battery protection and display settings into Home Assistant over Bluetooth, with no cloud and no account.

The vendor app only worked sometimes. Hazrien's replacement handles lighting, key binds and macros, confirms every change with the pad, and adds app-aware keys that run different actions depending on the program in front.

Adrian jailbroke his Kindle, removed Amazon's extra software and added Tailscale. Articles saved on his home server and his book library now sync straight to the reader.

There is no official xBloom API; recipes lived only in the phone app. Janczykkkko's command-line tool loads recipes from YAML files, shows live weight from the machine's scale and programs the dial presets, so everyday coffees brew with no phone.

The original seven-button panel is hard to find and expensive to replace. danderik88 built a 10-inch ESPHome touch panel that plugs into the same cable: 12 V main switch, water pump, temperatures, grey-water alarm and a Home Assistant dashboard. The distribution unit stays untouched.

Emaldo has no public API and no local access, only its app. The integration brings solar, grid, battery and load readings into Home Assistant every 10 seconds, plus daily energy totals and schedule, EV-charge and grid-export controls.

The clock only works paired to an Echo. Mike Janofsky's integration lets Home Assistant drive it instead: the LED ring shows Assist and Home Assistant timers, and the time is re-synced every 30 minutes. Nothing on the clock is modified and nothing touches Amazon's servers.

open creator post ↗ protocol repoha integration

The treadmill's own screen nagged for an iFit subscription. keranm replaced the console app: belt and incline run with no login, no subscription and no internet, plus hill-profile walks, per-person profiles and optional Home Assistant control.

Konrad Iturbe reverse engineered DJI's camera protocol to build an Android app that downloads photos and video from Osmo cameras without DJI's Mimo app, SDK, login or activation.

Luke Lashley, who maintains the Roborock integration in Home Assistant, runs a copy of Roborock's cloud backend on your own network. Vacuums keep live maps and local control without the internet, and nothing has to be rooted or opened.

OpticMystic's custom firmware loads into RAM from a USB stick and adds stems playback and UI themes to the XDJ-XZ. A power cycle returns it to stock.

ideaCompany's web studio talks to the TR-8S over its reverse-engineered SysEx protocol, mirrors the machine live, and includes an assistant that builds grooves on the hardware using your own Claude subscription.

EffectiveEquivalent's desktop EQ editor writes straight to the cable's onboard DSP over USB. It gives fractional-dB gain where the stock app shows whole dB, and adds a preamp.

Dmitry Brant brought the 25-year-old Linux ftape driver up to date as a loadable module, so his old tape drives run on Xubuntu 24.04 for data recovery instead of a CentOS 3.5 machine.

Christian Schaller rebuilt Dell's Windows-only webcam settings app for Linux, integrated with PipeWire, and wrote a GNOME Shell extension with a settings app for his Elgato Key Light.

open write-up ↗ webcam appelgato extension

Tom Wilkie built a Home Assistant integration and Python client for his shutters: open or closed, tilt angle and battery, with the hub found automatically on the network.

Aquaspaces writes a full parametric EQ, up to 10 filters, into the headset's own custom preset slots. It stays on the headset over the dongle, USB-C and Bluetooth, with no firmware flash.

alanstrok made his power station act as a standard NUT UPS server over Bluetooth, so Unraid, Synology and other NUT clients shut down cleanly on low battery. No EcoFlow cloud.

Razer offers no Mac software for this mouse. gh123man built a native macOS app that sets DPI, lighting, button remaps and onboard profiles over Bluetooth or USB.

Paul Faure documented his thermometer's Bluetooth protocol, including its authentication handshake, and built an ESPHome bridge that puts every probe and setting into Home Assistant.

Muzzammil Yasin Sabuwala's Fire TV Edition set had 129 MB of free memory and a home screen of mostly ads. A coding agent cleaned it up over ADB. dumbtv packages that cleanup with an undo for every step, its own home screen and an on-device DNS filter.

Bose shut down the SoundTouch cloud in May 2026. Sergei Ponomarenko brought back internet radio and the six preset buttons with a small relay for the streams and ESP32 firmware that catches preset presses and replays them to the speaker.

open repo ↗ creator postsoundtouch 10 alternative

manuaguirre9 built a homebrew player that boots alongside Sony's firmware: drag-and-drop music, 24-bit FLAC, Bluetooth headphones, podcasts over phone tethering and retro emulators. Deleting one folder restores the stock Walkman.

GLinnik21's native Plex client for LG webOS TVs draws its interface on the GPU and plays video on the TV's own decoder. On his 2019 set the profile picker loads in about 3 seconds, against about 30 in the official app.

Christian Schaller wrote a Linux SANE backend for his Plustek film scanner: colour, gray, infrared and infrared dust removal, packaged for Fedora. He also built Negative Vibes, a GNOME app for scanning negatives and slides.

open repo ↗ write-upnegative vibeshw-harness

An opinionated Arch Linux desktop. On compatible Intel Macs it keeps the hardware in service with a different OS and workflow.

open site ↗ mac guidemacbook air reportt2 linux supportcreator interview

Browser controller with volume, sound presets, schedules and the shortcuts the owner uses daily.

Activities, routes, settings and training features for Suunto watches stranded when Movescount shut down.

Mertol Kasanan reverse-engineered his printer's Bluetooth protocol after existing libraries didn't match his variant. Basic image output works.

Home Assistant integration with local control, status and Wi-Fi setup for a coffee machine whose app is obsolete.

Joseph Spurrier rebuilt a local stack for a dead sleep company's hardware: bedside orb, Slee