The new Thread protocol (part of Matter) is basically Zigbee on steroids which gets it up to parity with Z-wave. The reason to choose Z-wave over Thread is that Z-wave works now and has many devices available to buy, while Thread works in theory and the devices are very few in number. Thread devices are due out in force next year. So this actually is perfect timing for Z-wave to make this move now, right as the first wave of Thread devices are approaching.
There were a bunch of missed opportunities for Zigbee to become enshrined in the home.
For example, the first and second-gen Nest thermostats had a Zigbee radio built-in. At acquisition by Google, Nest heavily leaned into the wifi/cloud side for control and the Zigbee radio was squandered, other than for some esoteric “Works with Nest” protocol that maybe 2 other third-party devices supported.
It's definitely not as proprietary, which is probably relevant to a lot of potential implementers. There's close to no public information about Zigbee implementations while Google invites people to implement Thread through OpenThread.
Thread likely has more features with some pretty fully featured networking support, which some may consider positive, but some negative.
> Matter started life in 2019 as Project CHIP (Connected Home over IP), a collaboration between some of the biggest players in tech; Apple, Google, Amazon, Samsung, the Zigbee Alliance, and various other tech brands, which aimed to create a unified smart home standard. [0]
Ahh, that explains it. I bought most of my devices a few years before this existed, and having those companies involved pretty much guarantees people expecting this to succeed over anything else.
Honestly though, Google and Amazon being involved make me less interested in it. It pretty much guarantees requiring a cloud connection.
> Honestly though, Google and Amazon being involved make me less interested in it. It pretty much guarantees requiring a cloud connection.
1. Except the spec says otherwise...
Matter is basically a reworked Zigbee-over-IP with a special "we think you should use Thread" push. The spec (which is public), requires devices to work over LAN, but provides an escape for devices to have extra proprietary functionalities that aren't in spec. It doesn't require LAN-only, but it is "at least LAN".
The spec is based off HomeKit's networking model (IP based + mDNS discovery) with a data model closer to Zigbee's (binary format, device node/trait/tree). Its design-by-committee so you have lots of features, some of which expect a cloud (ability for devices to upload logs) and some which don't (general device control). Almost none should require a specific cloud (eg. OTAs can come from any hub, signed by manufacturer, logs can be uploaded to any hub's cloud).
You should be able to run any hub/voice-assistant/controller you want. Apple HomePods should allow most cloud-free control for a major company's product, while something like HomeAssistant will allow complete OS self-hosted control.
2. Google and Amazon obviously have cloud interfaces, but both also already allow LAN-control of smarthome devices already, and that will accelerate as they push into matter.
This will help them lower cloud hosting costs themselves (which is a major expense, see Alexa layoffs). Amazon seems less committed to Matter, but Google was one of the major matter contributors (along with Apple), and "donated" a bunch of IP to get it working (eg thread). Most companies will probably push for LAN control due to latency/UX impacts, especially since the can still gather out-of-band performance metrics via hubs.
Alexa and Google Assistant are starting to move to on-device NLU and processing, so cloud-phobia or aversion is likely not going to be a major problem in a few years.
Any reasoning why? My home automation is 95%+ Zigbee, and I don't see any issues. Mesh networking works very nicely, reaching far corners of the house.
Z-Wave's mesh networking was a giant pain to get functioning correctly, and good luck if devices were multiple hops away... things would just randomly fall off the network.
With Zigbee (IKEA TRADFRI and Philips Hue) I haven' had any of those issues, nor with any of my Thread devices.
I have some zigbee stuff with HA, and I have made some custom sensors with esphome. I'd like to try some thread stuff.
How are you currently using thread/what are you using it with? Do you have any recommendations for how to get started with it now - I've been rather confused as it feels like its in limbo right now.
My Thread devices are all HomeKit devices, and they work incredibly well. Once they are joined to the Thread network they show up as IPv6 devices in mDNS and just work.
I have a ton of Thread enabled lightbulbs, smart outlets, and sensors on Thread, and I haven't had any issues.
They seem to mesh really well, store and forward for devices that are sleepy just works, but sleepy devices waking up and sending traffic is almost instant.
I do not own any devices that use WiFi, other than my Ecobee thermostat. So I can't compare against that. I would put the Thread devices up there alongside the Zigbee devices in terms of reliability, if not more resilient since I have multiple thread border router capable devices (multiple HomePod mini's and Apple TV's with Thread) so a device getting restarted (unlike a Zigbee hub like Hue/IKEA TRADFRI) won't affect the network/ability for the devices to trigger responses.
> Once they are joined to the Thread network they show up as IPv6 devices in mDNS and just work.
I don't have any thread devices but I've been eyeing them.
Do they show up to your router/networking gear as IP6 devices? I know that this is the underlying tech, and use mDNS, and thread routers are IP routers, but I always assumed they wouldn't integrate with existing IP home networks.
I see mDNS advertisements with my devices in them (such as Nanoleaf bulbs/Eve Thread devices), with a custom IPv6 prefix from the ULA, I assume assigned by my Thread border router.
The advertisements are captured by Avahi on my router... so they are on my existing IP home network.
AFAIK the majority of Zigbee products only act as end device nodes and don't act as routers. So they won't actually be doing anything to extend the mesh.
The main benefits of ZWave over Zigbee is superior penetration, improved interoperability, and reduced interference with WiFi devices.
One of the biggest issues with Zigbee is vendors selling devices that only work with their gateway. As a consumer it sucks because it's rare for a single vendor to excel or even offer devices in every product category.
