Matter over Thread buttons for direct binding?

[SeanTek (Sean)]

What are the matter over thread buttons that support direct binding, and that actually work? Using SmartThings as the ecosystem is preferable, but I suppose not required if you can get the button and the target to talk to each other directly.

I was debating about trashing or upgrading my LIFX lights, and ended up trying to stick with LIFX for another cycle. However, I am only buying new LIFX lights that are Matter-advertised and enabled. It does seem that these Matter devices can be added to SmartThings directly, bypassing the LIFX cloud linkage. However, I need a way to control the LIFX lights using buttons that act locally, not over the cloud.

It seems that Zigbee/Z-Wave buttons that communicate with the SmartThings hub, which then communicate with LIFX using Matter (I suspect Matter-over-Wi-Fi, but I’m not entirely sure) locally, will solve most of the latency problem, but I would like native Matter buttons to do the job as well with direct binding.

[mocelet]

If you mean battery-powered remotes, I’m not aware of any that supports binding. Plus, the only platform that allows the user to set bindings is Home Assistant, SmartThings doesn’t support them:

Support for Matter OnOff and Level clients?

Hi, @mocelet Sorry for the delay, I was checking some details with the engineering team. So, it is correct that client clusters aren’t supported because they require the support of bindings. There’s a special handling for some cases like the one you mentioned but it is not available for custom drivers since the workaround requires internal configurations. And for the reference of your device, as it only supports client clusters, it cannot be supported until bindings get implemented but there’s no ETA yet.

As for Zigbee buttons controlling Matter lights, you definitely can via automations, although in SmartThings you’ll need some workarounds since there are no actions for relative brightness.

Ironically, who nails dimming Matter lights with Zigbee buttons is IKEA, I shared some comments about the DIRIGERA. Matter support is beta right now so not 100% stable, but the dimming is wonderful since it uses native Matter commands for smooth dimming instead of going step by step.

Matter - smart home connectivity standard (formerly Project CHIP)

Couple more notes about the DIRIGERA. First quick one, if you change the name of a bridged device in SmartThings it changes in IKEA app too!! It’s a Matter feature but caught me off guard! Second one, I was able to use the hub as Matter controller, directly adding a spare Nanoleaf light. It would disconnect a lot though (it’s beta after all), which lets me appreciate how good SmartThings / Aeotec hub deals with Matter over Thread devices since it was probably a Matter controller issue, the Thread network is the same after all. DIRIGERA has some nice tricks for Matter lights: It is 100% local, including the app, so you can fully control the lights offline, unlike… . There are super-easy to create locally executed wake-up and wind-down routines tha…

In any case, getting Matter compatible lights is a good strategy. My go-to lights are WiZ because they have WiZmotes that work even with the WiFi or the hub down, it’s essentially a proprietary binding. Nanoleaf also has proprietary remotes (Nanoleaf Sense+) that bind using their own protocol.

Hopefully in the future we’ll see remotes that bind to Matter, right now the only options are some wall dimmers like the Inovelli.

[SeanTek (Sean)]

Have you used the White matter over thread wall dimmer from Innovelli, with SmartThings, and/or with LIFX Matter lights?

[mocelet]

I haven’t since LIFX has no presence in EU and the Inovelli EU model is “sold out”.

You can find experiences with bindings using the Inovelli here.

Edit: typo, it’s only one n