Matter (standard)

Matter is a technical standard for smart home and Internet of things (IoT) devices. It aims to improve interoperability and compatibility between different manufacturers and security, and always allowing local control as an option.

Matter originated in December 2019 as the Project Connected Home over IP (CHIP) working group, founded by Amazon, Apple, Google, and the Connectivity Standards Alliance (when it was the Zigbee Alliance). Subsequent members include IKEA, Huawei, Heiman, and Schneider. Version 1.0 of the specification was published on 4 October 2022. The Matter software development kit is open-source under the Apache License.

A software development kit (SDK) is provided royalty-free, though the ability to commission a finished product into a Matter network in the field mandates certification and membership fees, entailing both one-time, recurring, and per-product costs. This is enforced using a public key infrastructure (PKI) and so-called device attestation certificates.

Matter-compatible software updates for many existing hubs became available in late 2022, with Matter-enabled devices and software updates starting to release in 2023.

The primary goal of Matter is to improve interoperability for the current smart home ecosystem. CSA and its members aim for the Matter logo to become ubiquitous and for consumers to instantly recognise it as a smart home device that will "just work". However, Matter logos do not imply that devices will "just work"; infrastructure is also still required for full functionality, like a Wi-Fi network (which may need to be dual-band) and a Matter controller, and often, an app for each kind of device.