5 ms·

RIP. The ikea zigbee stuff was close to being best in class. Matter is still an unusable mess.

CharlesW 1y ago
In my experience, Matter already works better than Zigbee and Z-Wave ever did, and it gets better every year. I'm interested in what your unusable mess of a system consists of, if you don't mind elaborating.
- kstrauser 1y ago
  That’s been my experience. My older Zigbee/Z-Wave stuff seemed to work… up until it didn’t, and then cue wailing and gnashing of teeth. My Matter gear was initially a little flaky but is now vastly more reliable than Zigbee ever was.
- snickerdoodle12 1y ago
  Just look at how long this page is: https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/matter/ https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/matter/ Adding a device now requires a whole song & dance with bluetooth, a mobile phone and god knows what else. Meanwhile zigbee is: 1. Buy a zigbee stick, there are dozens, they all work great 2. Press the permit join button in home assistant 3. Press a button on the device for 10 seconds or 3 times or whatever 4. You're done and it works! Oh, and for some reason https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/matter/#experiment-with-matter-using-a-esp32-dev-board https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/matter/#experimen... involves google cloud in the process of me testing a device I created locally on my own network The final nail in the coffin is: > It is recommended to run the Matter add-on on Home Assistant OS. This is currently the only supported option. Other installation types are without support and at your own risk. So I can't even officially use this stuff without uprooting my entire operating system.
  - amanda99 1y ago
    Look, I agree with you and as someone with Home Assistant, I much prefer Zigbee. But if you imagine a typical consumer, not a tech nerd, I think "smartphone and bluetooth" is by far preferable to your 4-step process.
    - snickerdoodle12 1y ago
      To be fair, step 4 isn't a real step, step 1 is just buying the "hub" or "border router" or whatever, and step 2 & 3 are the same for Zigbee and Matter, the button is just somewhere else. A typical consumer has bought a zigbee hub (like they need to buy a thread border router), then use their phone to press a button in the app and then they press a button on the device. Still dead simple and doesn't require flaky bluetooth from their phone, which in 2025 most androids still suffer from.
Marsymars 1y ago
I have stuff that didn’t support Matter on launch, that I updated to Matter, and it seems exactly the same in practice.
J_Shelby_J 1y ago
No it wasn’t. My impression is it’s nice looking, but poorly implemented. I have near 100 zigbee and z wave devices. IKEA stuff is the only ones that have given me problems. I have their square color light panels and had to write a HA automation to flick them every power cycle because they get stuck and nonresponsive. Maybe I judge them poorly because they’re the cheapest devices I let myself buy? Idk. They look great though.

In my experience, Matter already works better than Zigbee and Z-Wave ever did, and it gets better every year. I'm interested in what your unusable mess of a system consists of, if you don't mind elaborating.

kstrauser 1y ago
That’s been my experience. My older Zigbee/Z-Wave stuff seemed to work… up until it didn’t, and then cue wailing and gnashing of teeth. My Matter gear was initially a little flaky but is now vastly more reliable than Zigbee ever was.
snickerdoodle12 1y ago
Just look at how long this page is: https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/matter/ https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/matter/ Adding a device now requires a whole song & dance with bluetooth, a mobile phone and god knows what else. Meanwhile zigbee is: 1. Buy a zigbee stick, there are dozens, they all work great 2. Press the permit join button in home assistant 3. Press a button on the device for 10 seconds or 3 times or whatever 4. You're done and it works! Oh, and for some reason https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/matter/#experiment-with-matter-using-a-esp32-dev-board https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/matter/#experimen... involves google cloud in the process of me testing a device I created locally on my own network The final nail in the coffin is: > It is recommended to run the Matter add-on on Home Assistant OS. This is currently the only supported option. Other installation types are without support and at your own risk. So I can't even officially use this stuff without uprooting my entire operating system.
- amanda99 1y ago
  Look, I agree with you and as someone with Home Assistant, I much prefer Zigbee. But if you imagine a typical consumer, not a tech nerd, I think "smartphone and bluetooth" is by far preferable to your 4-step process.
  - snickerdoodle12 1y ago
    To be fair, step 4 isn't a real step, step 1 is just buying the "hub" or "border router" or whatever, and step 2 & 3 are the same for Zigbee and Matter, the button is just somewhere else. A typical consumer has bought a zigbee hub (like they need to buy a thread border router), then use their phone to press a button in the app and then they press a button on the device. Still dead simple and doesn't require flaky bluetooth from their phone, which in 2025 most androids still suffer from.

Marsymars 1y ago

I have stuff that didn’t support Matter on launch, that I updated to Matter, and it seems exactly the same in practice.

J_Shelby_J 1y ago

No it wasn’t. My impression is it’s nice looking, but poorly implemented. I have near 100 zigbee and z wave devices. IKEA stuff is the only ones that have given me problems. I have their square color light panels and had to write a HA automation to flick them every power cycle because they get stuck and nonresponsive. Maybe I judge them poorly because they’re the cheapest devices I let myself buy? Idk. They look great though.