Hello all,
I am seeing my matter devices (switchbot blind tilts) in apple home.
Is there anyway to get these into home assistant (pushed from apple home)
I have a homepod mini.
I do not have a skyconnect or matter controller connected to my pi home assistant server- I really feel like this doesn’t matter, no pun intended. Based on the instructions I am linking below from the docs.
I am trying to follow the docs, specifically the section using the homepod mini as border router
The devices currently show in apple home. The docs say to remove them and that they will be automatically discovered by the homekit controller integration. Is this now called “homekit device” in the integrations list??- I have assumed so.
After removal the homekit device from apple home, the homekit device integration never finds the matter devices.
Can I get some help on troubleshooting this? Thank you all for any assistance you can give!
Switchbot Tilt appears to be a BLE device that communicates exclusively with the Switchbot Hub, which in turn exposes (“bridges”) the devices to your LAN using the Matter control protocol standard.
The “HomeKit Device” integration is referring to the HomeKit control protocol, an Apple-proprietary standard. The Apple Home ecosystem supports both Matter and HomeKit control protocols, so just because you see a device in Apple Home doesn’t mean it’s a HomeKit device, it can also be a Matter device. The Switchbot Tilt does not speak the HomeKit protocol, which is why it is not being discovered by HA.
Unlike the HomeKit protocol, the Matter protocol permits a device (or hub) to communicate with more than one control server (“fabric”). So if you have a Matter device in Apple Home, you can open the accessory settings and “share” the device (or hub) with another fabric (e.g. Home Assistant) using a setup code.
Home Assistant uses an optional add-on for users that want to control Matter devices. Before your HA server can “speak” the Matter protocol over your LAN, you need to install and configure the Matter (BETA) Add-on, then you can click the “Add Integration” button under Devices & Settings, and follow the prompts to enter the setup code from Apple Home. You do not need any special hardware for this, the Matter add-on uses a regular TCP/IP network to communicate with devices (or hubs). Note you do need to ensure IPv6 is enabled on your HA server (some people have it turned off for some reason).
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@peterxian Thank you so much for this well written response.
I’ll explain my situation a little more in hopes that you can add some more value or correct me if I’m wrong with what I’m getting ready to say.
In my instance, I have the switchbot tilts connected to the switchbot hub 2 which is matter enabled. I have the devices showing up in apple home through the matter connection with the switch hub 2.
So now I should be able to go into the accessory settings within apple home for the device and share it to home assistant using the setup code?
EDIT: I did exactly as you said with the setup code gathered from apple home and used the “add matter device” within the devices page of home assistant and everything worked perfectly!
Thank you so much for laying this out in a very simple easy to understand write up.
