The Connectivity Standards Alliance is pleased to announce the most recent update to Matter, version 1.3 of the specification and SDK, now accessible for device manufacturers and platforms to integrate into their products.
This latest release signifies a significant step forward, enabling devices to be more supportive to users in the kitchen and laundry room, enhancing entertainment and smart home interaction on screens, and fortifying the smart home with new energy and water management support.
The inclusion of these new device types and functionalities in Matter 1.3 allows product makers and controllers to begin implementing and certifying these features into new and existing products. As the Alliance’s member companies dedicate time to integrate, test, and deploy new features, updates, and devices to the market, they reported anticipating upcoming announcements of products delivering these fresh capabilities to users through Matter.
With the steadfast support of membership and the active involvement of a robust community of engineers and product specialists globally, members remain dedicated to Matter as the industry’s optimal approach to providing enhanced simplicity, interoperability, security, and value to consumers. With the rollout of version 1.3, Matter continues to extend its presence across the smart home industry and the IoT ecosystem.
New support for water and energy management devices
- Energy Management— To aid users in understanding and managing their energy usage, saving money, and reducing their carbon footprint, Matter 1.3 introduces new energy reporting capabilities. This allows any device type to incorporate the ability to report actual and estimated measurements, including instantaneous power, voltage, current, and others, in real-time, as well as its energy consumption or generation over time
- Electric Vehicle Charging — The energy features in Matter 1.3 also facilitate new energy-centric devices, starting with Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment (EVSE). This allows EV Charging equipment manufacturers to present consumers with a user-friendly method to control how and when they charge their vehicles. It includes the ability to manually start or stop charging, adjust the charging rate or specify how many miles of range to be added by a set departure time, allowing the charging station to automatically optimise charging to occur at the most economical and environmentally friendly times
- Water Management—Support for leak and freeze detectors, rain sensors, and controllable water valves offers homeowners enhanced monitoring, management, and safeguarding over water in and around their residences.
New major appliance types
With Matter 1.3, support is being introduced for additional appliances, encompassing a variety of major household devices essential for everyday living.
The newly supported device types include:
- Microwave Ovens — Users can regulate the cooking time, power level, and operational mode and receive notifications, such as “end of cycle” or “food ready” when the microwave completes operation. For a microwave installed in an “over-the-range” configuration, the specification also supports control of an extractor fan and light typical in such setups.
- Ovens — Configurations such as built-in, stand-alone, or as part of a range with an associated cooktop are included in the Matter 1.3 update. Each oven compartment can be individually controlled from an operational mode perspective with information related to the state of the oven (i.e., preheating or cooling). Notifications such as preheating and target temperature achieved are supported.
- Cooktop — Matter 1.3 includes support for cooktops, allowing for remote access and control (typically induction-based devices). The cooktop’s individual elements enable temperature control and measurement.
- Extractor Hood (Cooker Hood, Vent Hood) — Matter 1.3 supports cooktops and ranges in conjunction with cooktop hoods. It allows for the control of both the light and fan settings in such devices, as well as the status/end-of-life of any filter material used.
- Laundry Dryers — With Matter 1.2 already supporting laundry washers, Matter 1.3 completes the pairing with the addition of support for laundry dryers. Users can set the dryer mode and target temperature and, depending on local safety regulations, remotely start and stop the dryer. Notifications like “end of cycle” and alarms on error states are supported.
Enhanced entertainment and smart home management functionality for media devices
- Matter Casting Media Players / TVs —Matter 1.3 offers improvements to TV functionality, including push messages and dialog support for new ambient experiences, casting initialisation enhancements, expanded interactivity options for TV apps, text and track support, and improved search functionality. Interaction with other devices in the home is also enhanced, enabling other Matter devices to send notifications to TVs or other devices with screens.
Additional new features and core improvements
The latest update to Matter offers more than just new device types and capabilities; it also includes new features and core improvements that can enhance Matter-enabled user experiences.
User experience enhancements
- Scenes — Scenes are now supported, providing a standards-based method for product makers and smart home platforms to set, read, and activate scenes on devices. Scenes enable users to create a desired state for devices, rooms, or their whole home, by combining settings in devices that can be triggered with one command. Devices are also able to store what scenes they are a part of, reducing the number of individual commands needed to execute a scene transition, and improving responsiveness.
- Command Batching — A Matter controller can now batch multiple commands into a single message when communicating with Matter devices to minimise the delay between the execution of those commands.
There’s plenty of other editorial on our sister site, Electronic Specifier! Or you can always join in the conversation by commenting below or visiting our LinkedIn page.
