Smart home ecosystem consistency is coming

The smart home ecosystem is rather splintered with consumers having to check badges that say “Works with Apple Home or “Works with Google” on the product.

Now, things will get simpler for manufacturers, with the Connectivity Standards Alliance (CSA) announcing that Apple, Google and Samsung smart home products will accept its certification.

This matters because the CSA runs Matter, which is supposed to be the industry smart home standard. In other words, if it works with Matter it should work with other smart home platforms. Developed by Amazon, Apple, Google and Samsung, among others, Matter enables more convenient communications between IoT devices.

Now, the gadget makers can get their product certified as a Matter device by the CSA and this will mean they can automatically get certification badges from the other ecosystems. However, Amazon remains the major hold-out for the time being.

Last spring, Google revealed plans to launch a Home API that would enable third-party apps to easily tap into smart home devices, but made that API available only to a few select partners for initial testing. But at CES 2025, Google shared that it’s releasing the Home API to public preview.

This means developers everywhere can start creating applications using the toolkit to interface with smart home devices, especially when limitations are further lifted later this year when the Home API leaves the preview and becomes fully available to the general public.

New chipset part of the energy management trend

MediaTek and Google have collaborated on a new chip purpose-built for smart home devices. The new SoC is called the MediaTek MT7903 and is supposed to offer more “robust and responsive smart home experiences.” Mainly intended to power Google Home’s ecosystem, the new chipset comes with tri-band WiFi 6E, Bluetooth 6, and IFEE 802.15.4/Thread radios. This means manufacturers who deploy the chipset can integrate the Thread protocol and support Matter giving it a wide use case.

A feature of the SoC is its “Thread border router offload” which is a low-power feature that allows the chipset to maintain a connection with other devices even when asleep, as 9to5google reports. Energy management was the feature most mentioned by smart home experts in a trends survey conducted by Forbes, alongside security, with smart home locks getting especial attention this year.

Consumers will begin noticing the U.S. Cyber Trust Mark

Like EnergyStar labels did for energy efficiency, the U.S. government is now incentivizing companies to produce more cyber secure devices. The White House announced that it’s launching the “U.S. Cyber Trust Mark” so that American consumers can more easily check if connected devices are cyber secure.

The cybersecurity labeling program for wireless interconnected smart products will be voluntary and will be administered by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The label is designed to allay concerns over the increasing number of smart wireless interconnected devices in homes – from baby monitors to voice-activated assistants – and their exposure to hacking and cyber attacks.

The U.S. Cyber Trust Mark program allows manufacturers to test products against established cybersecurity criteria from the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology via accredited labs to earn the Cyber Trust Mark label.

Steve Downer, vice president at Amazon, said: “Amazon supports the U.S. Cyber Trust Mark’s goal to strengthen consumer trust in connected devices.” Michael Dolan, a senior director at Best Buy, commented: “It is a positive step forward for consumers and we are excited about the opportunity to highlight this program for our customers.”

Article Topics

Apple  |  certification  |  Connectivity Standards Alliance (CSA)  |  cybersecurity  |  Google  |  Matter  |  Samsung  |  smart homes  |  standards