is a senior reviewer focused on smart home and connected tech, with over twenty years of experience. She has written previously for Wirecutter, Wired, Dwell, BBC, and US News.
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For Matter, this year was never going to be about flashy new features. Other than support for security cameras, which I hear should finally arrive this fall, 2025 is all about fixing problems. And with Matter 1.4.2, announced today, the smart home standard is taking an encouraging step forward.
Back in January, Tobin Richardson, president and CEO of the Connectivity Standards Alliance (the organization that runs Matter), told me this year would be all about “focusing on fixing these reliability and performance issues.” Now, over halfway through 2025, the CSA is finally looking to make good on that promise, and showing signs that it’s prepared to push the platforms harder to work together and adopt these new specs sooner.
Matter 1.4.2 brings more standardization, so devices behave the same whether you’re using Amazon Alexa, Apple Home, Google Home, or any Matter platform; improvements to how devices communicate, which should mean fewer random disconnects and faster responses; and a big reliability push.
And where does reliability in the smart home start? With your Wi-Fi router.
Home routers and access points were added to Matter in 1.4, and the latest spec lays the foundations for Matter ecosystems to automatically optimize router settings to help your gadgets get connected and stay connected to your network. This includes things like managing multicast traffic (a way devices communicate over a network) and storing Thread network credentials to help devices connect to the right Thread network.
While there aren’t any Matter-certified routers yet, the potential here is huge. Router settings are one of the most common reasons a device won’t connect to a network, and the user is normally left to figure that out. With this feature, your smart home platform could potentially fix these problems before they arise.
The spec sets new minimum standards for how many devices a router can support, including at least 150 Thread devices and 100 Wi-Fi devices. It also adds support for Target Wake Time to help battery-powered devices conserve energy.
Another big change is that 1.4.2 brings Wi-Fi-only commissioning. Currently, Bluetooth is the only way to onboard a device to Matter, so every Matter device has to have a Bluetooth radio that may only be used during setup. With Wi-Fi commissioning, manufacturers won’t need to build Bluetooth into every device, which could mean cheaper gadgets. The onboarding experience would be the same, though: scan the Matter code into your ecosystem app.
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