In the smart home industry, it has long faced the “Tower of Babel Dilemma”. Each brand and ecology uses its own “dialect” and is incompatible with each other.
Since Apple released HomeKit in 2014, there have been constant calls for unified standards. It was not until Matter 1.0 was released in 2022 that an industry-level standard protocol truly emerged.
Now, four years later, Matter has developed to version 1.4.
The Matter protocol is led by the Connection Standards Alliance (CSA), and giants such as Apple, Google, Amazon, and Samsung are core members.
Its underlying communication is based on the IP protocol. In theory, any device that supports TCP/IP can access the Matter network.
Matter 1.4 will be released in May 2026 and has many important upgrades compared to previous versions.
First of all, the new device types are expanded from “light + lock + sensor” to the whole house.
Matter 1.0 only supports a few basic device types, while the official device types of Matter 1.4 have been expanded to 23 categories, adding sweeping robots, refrigerators, washing machines and other equipment.
This expansion enables Matter to begin covering “high-value scenarios” and enhances the “presence” of the protocol.
Secondly, the underlying upgrade of Thread 1.4 solves the two major pain points of “distance” and “delay”.
Thread is one of Matter’s lowest-level wireless communication protocols. Thread 1.4 brings upgrades to automatic failover and distance expansion.
Automatic failover allows the network to automatically switch when the main Border Router is powered off, making it transparent to users; distance expansion increases the number of Mesh hops from 4 to 8 hops, and the maximum coverage distance is extended from about 100 meters to about 300 meters, which is a substantial improvement for users in villas or large apartments.
Furthermore, the Enhanced Multi-Admin function realizes “once network configuration, global use”.
The previous version of Matter had a cumbersome multi-administrator setup process, but Matter 1.4 uses an enhanced credential sharing protocol to allow devices to be automatically discovered and authorized by other ecosystems after being networked in one ecosystem, approaching the ideal of “you can just buy it and use it at home”.
In terms of ecological support, Apple is the most active and has the best experience. Starting from iOS 16, Apple Home has been the “native citizen” of Matter, iOS
Support for Matter devices in 20 has reached “zero awareness”, and Thread Border Router support is complete.
Google has a positive attitude but is a little slow in implementation. There is a gap between Google Home’s Matter network experience and Apple Home.
Amazon is lagging behind and is slow to support Matter.
Samsung SmartThings fully supports Matter, while Chinese manufacturers such as Huawei Hongmeng, Xiaomi Mijia, and Alibaba Tmall Genie are currently in the “wait and see” stage of supporting Matter.
In the actual experience, 30 Matter devices were deployed in the test apartment, using three ecological controls: Apple Home, Google Home and SmartThings.
The good news is that the basic functions are available “out of the box”, the network configuration success rate is 100%, and the average network configuration time is about 12 seconds.
The bad news is that advanced functions still need to be accessed using their respective native apps. Matter unifies the “lower layer communication” but does not unify the “upper layer experience”.
At the same time, there are problems with the stability of the Thread network. About 5% of the devices need to be reconfigured after running for about 48 hours.
In terms of market size, as of May 2026, there are more than 3,500 certified Matter device models worldwide, an increase of nearly 200% compared to 2024.
Global shipments of Matter-compatible devices will be approximately 420 million units in 2025, and are expected to exceed 700 million units in 2026.
Thread device shipments are growing rapidly. Global Thread chip shipments will be approximately 280 million in 2025 and are expected to reach 500 million in 2026.
It is worth noting that the key to Matter’s success or failure may lie in China.
About 60% of the world’s smart home devices are produced in China, but local Chinese brands have almost zero support for Matter.
However, if the European and American markets adopt Matter as an entry standard, Chinese manufacturers may support Matter on export products, thereby driving the domestic market to follow suit.
