Alongside the new Wemo HomeKit Smart Video Doorbell, Belkin has unveiled that its Wemo Smart Plug, Smart Light Switch, and Smart Dimmer will be seeing an upgrade this year with Matter over Thread support. That will mean faster and more reliable connections with greater range for the HomeKit devices.
Belkin announced the Wemo news at CES this evening:
This year, Wemo will bring to market new versions of its most popular products – Wemo Smart Plug, Wemo Smart Light Switch, and Wemo Smart Dimmer – built with support for Matter over Thread. Working closely with member organizations within the Connectivity Standards Alliance and Thread Group including Amazon, Apple, Google and Samsung SmartThings, the new generation of Wemo smart plugs and lighting controls are engineered to easily integrate into the home, providing reliable connections between devices and seamless compatibility with any Matter-enabled product.
As a refresher, Matter is a new smart home standard coming from a collaboration between Apple, Amazon, Google, Samsung, the Connectivity Standards Alliance, and more. The big idea is to make it seamless for customers to know a smart home device will work with their setup (cross-platform) and also make them faster, more reliable, secure, and easy to use.
The underlying technology Matter is using to enable that is Thread. We’ve already seen a number of smart device company’s adopt Thread like Apple with HomePod mini, Nanoleaf, Eve, and more.
Belkin hasn’t shared specific pricing or release details for the new Wemo HomeKit Smart Plug, Switch, and Dimmer with Matter over Thread support but they will be coming “later this year in 25 countries.”
For reference, the current Wemo HomeKit-enabled Smart Plug goes for $25, Smart Light Switch sells for $30, and Smart Dimmer goes from $40 ($75 for a 2-pack).
9to5Mac’s Take
It’s great to see more smart home devices getting Matter/Thread support as it offers real-world improvements for smart home setups. I’ve been using Thread with several Nanoleaf smart lights, and the speed and reliability are noticeably better than most of my smart home devices without Thread.
The reason Thread excels is because it’s a purpose-made mesh networking protocol for smart home devices with direct peer-to-peer communication. It’s also self-maintaining and self-healing, which means you’re less likely to see “Device not responding” errors and the like. For a deeper dive into Thread, learn more here.
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