Connected Home Control

Matter: The New Foundation of the Connected Home

- By Curtis Franklin, Editor-In-Chief

Learn more about Matter, a unifying language that defines how devices identify themselves, expose capabilities, authenticate and communicate commands and state changes, and discover how it transforms your smart home into a cohesive, adaptive enviroment.

One of many IoT designers great dreams has been a straightforward technology to turn a collection of controlled devices into a controlled home.

One of the tools that has promised to deliver on this dream is Matter. Matter is an open-source, IP-based standard designed to make smart home devices from different manufacturers work together seamlessly. Launched in 2022 by the Connectivity Standards Alliance (CSA), it’s supported by tech giants including Amazon, Apple, and Google, aiming to simplify setup and control through a single app or voice assistant.

Matter originated in December 2019 as the Project Connected Home over IP (CHIP) working group, founded by Amazon, Apple, Google, and the Zigbee Alliance. Subsequent members, including IKEA, Huawei, and Schneider, have joined what is now called the Connectivity Standards Alliance (CSA). Some of the companies involved, along with their contributions and products supporting Matter, are shown in Table 1.

Version 1.0 of the Matter specification was published on October 4, 2022. Matter’s arrival represented an important point because it is built on open standards, governed by a broad consortium, and engineered to be secure, resilient, and future-proof. Unlike earlier attempts at unification, Matter is not tied to a single company's ecosystem or cloud. Instead, it is designed to run locally, support multiple radio technologies, and provide a consistent device model that all platforms can understand. This shift from proprietary silos to shared infrastructure is reshaping the expectations of manufacturers and consumers alike.