I just bought my first Matter over WiFi device. I know I can pair it with both Home Assistant and my Nest Hub.
But I'm curious if there's a best practice for which one to use as the primary Matter controller.
Or does it even matter?
I may not be understanding your question, but Matter consists of a controller and the devices it controls which is called a "Fabric". A Matter device can belong to multiple Fabrics (and thus be controlled by multiple controllers). However, regarding Matter Controllers, there really is no concept of primary/secondary and being able to "switch" between one or the other.
I understand a device can belong to multiple Fabrics, but wasn't sure if there was a "best" first Fabric to pair to before pairing to others.
The reason I started thinking about this is because the Hubitat Matter docs suggest to commission a Matter device with another platform first because Hubitat cannot put the device into pairing mode.
So I asked Gemini about this as well and it suggested adding it to Apple or Google home first as pairing with an iOS/Android phone makes it the process more reliable (vs pairing with Home Assistant may not be as reliable??).
It sounds like from your comment, that aside from Hubitat, it shouldn't matter which controller is the "primary".
If your main automations live in Home Assistant, I would commission it in HA first and then share it to Google or Apple with Matter multi-admin if you still want voice control there.
For a Matter over Wi-Fi device, your Nest Hub is not giving you a Thread-specific advantage, so there usually is not a big permanent "primary controller" benefit beyond the initial commissioning flow. HA-first tends to keep entity naming, automations, and troubleshooting in one place, while Google or Apple can stay secondary for assistants and dashboards.
I would only start with Google or Apple first if that specific device or vendor flow is known to commission more reliably there. Otherwise HA first, then share, is the cleaner setup.
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Ah OK.... here is a thought: The hardest problem with users trying to commission a Matter device "directly" to HA is when they are commissioning a Matter over Thread device using HA's OTBR. There are Thread credential complexities that I won't get into. However if you have an Apple/Google Home using one of their Thread compatible hubs, it is much easier to first do the Matter commissioning to their Hub then do a Matter "sharing" to HA's Matter Server (without the need to use HA's OTBR and its Thread credential complexities).
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Cool, thanks y'all!
I just got the device I mentioned in my original post (THIRDREALITY Garage Door Opener) and I tested pairing it with Google Home first and then adding to Home Assistant. Then I removed from both and tested adding in the opposite order.
Aside from Home Assistant app failing to pair at first (but was fine on the second try), I don't see any differences in either methodology.