Matter is the new standard that is supposed to make the smart home all better, but you have one key decision to make when choosing new products – Wi-Fi or Thread? Let’s talk about the details of when you want one or the other, or another option like Matter over a bridge.
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CHAPTERS:
00:00 Intro
00:50 What is Matter
01:26 Wi-Fi vs Thread
02:50 Matter over bridge
04:21 Wi-Fi vs Thread for each product type
05:22 Network setup for new devices
#smarthome #matter #thread
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The biggest issue I have with Mater that people NEED to know and NO ONE talks about it is most of these devices will have like 50 features like energy monitoring and sceen selection and then you add it to mater and all you get is On/Off features exposed. This is the MOST frustrating thing in the world and all these other features are only exposed if you use a 3rd party instagration in HomeAssistant or even worse only available in their app. NO COMPANY explains this or what features are available over what protocol. Do your research and see what features it says it has and what matter even supports because if it does not support it then it cannot be possibly exposed over matter. Even still it might be supported but the manufacturer just does not expose that. Kasaya is bad for this wanted energy monitoring plugs and found out the energy monitoring we not exposed JUST the on off… very frustrating and there need to be a standard created for labeling if you use the matter symbol then you MUST provide a matter chart that explains what matter items are exposed. THIS to me is the most frustrating part of matter!!
“Because your kid unplugged it.” – That hit hard! 😂😂 – Great vid, thanks!
AFAIC, they’re all a scam. All the new IKEA “Matter” devices don’t work on WiFi. Also, heard of people trying them with Thread and they still didn’t work. How many effing silly little boxes do we need? n+1, always n+1
Great walkthrough. Zigbee and Thread are very similar. Zigbee just have one coordinator compared to Thread that can have more Thread border routers.
I have had smart home with Zigbee mesh network the last 10 years. My advice is to use Matter over Thread for critical products in your home, such as light, smoke alarms etc.
Use Matter over WiFi for all the none critical products such as colored light on the wall.
That said, I will always look for devices that are Matter over Thread first. The more devices you have on Matter over Thread, the stronger Thread mesh network you have.
Matter over WiFi also have another Single Point of Failure; your WiFi 😉
Matter over Thread can communicate directly from switch to bulb, if they are on the same Thread network. So do not create a Thread network per manufacturer, that is very important!
Eric, Thank you. I realize this video is 1 year old. But we are not yet on Thread 1.4, so the still current issue of multiple/parallel thread networks is not resolved. I hope you will talk about this problem to make more people aware of why they may be encountering problems with sluggish thread networks or keeping device online. Or pointing out turning a device that may be serving also as a TBR may be the thread (path) for a different device and and when they shut down the TBR, they may be removing its path to a Matter Controller, by accident. And its easy to accidentally have 2+ thread network running and stepping on each other. thanks again