#Thread Groups

1 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

clever widget
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Does Matter over Thread support groups like ZigBee does? If I have multiple bulbs in a room then without ZigBee groups I always got rippling with different lights turning on in different orders and ZigBee groups always solved that.

Is there an equivalent in Matter over Thread and does HA Matter Server / Thread BR support it?

glossy jetty
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I don't know of any ecosystem for which this is currently supported.

silver dagger
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I have Aqara T2 and Philips Hue Matter over Thread bulbs. Both support Groups on Endpoint 1.

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Philips Hue:

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Aqara T2:

glossy jetty
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🔎 1) Matter and Groups — current state of the standard

The Matter protocol includes a “Groups” Cluster in its specification. This cluster defines group commands (AddGroup, RemoveGroup, GetGroupMembership, etc.) that allow managing groups of nodes (multicast) at the Matter network level.

However, in real-world smart home ecosystems:

  • Many client platforms do not yet expose a native user interface to create or manage Matter groups or to send groupcast (multicast) commands from their apps.
  • Home Assistant, Google Home, Apple Home, etc. are Matter controllers according to the specification, but their actual support for group management beyond scenes and automations is still limited.

👉 Key point:

Support for native Matter group management (creating a group, assigning devices, sending a single multicast command to that group) depends both on the Matter controller software and on how each platform implements it, not just on the fact that the feature exists in the standard.

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🛠 2) Available Matter controllers

Commonly used Matter controllers include:

🌐 Consumer platforms

  • Home Assistant — can act as a Matter Controller to control certified Matter devices.
  • Apple Home (via HomePod, Apple TV, iPhone/iPad) — Matter controller within the Apple ecosystem.
  • Google Home / Nest Hubs / Chromecast — Matter controllers on the Google side.
  • Amazon Alexa / recent Echo devices — Matter controller via the Alexa app.
  • Samsung SmartThings Hub — Matter controller.
  • Some Aqara, SwitchBot, and other certified Matter hubs.

📌 All of these controllers can control individual Matter devices and participate in a Matter fabric, but they do not necessarily provide native, explicit management of “Matter groups” in their UI.

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📌 3) Actual support for Matter group management

This is the key takeaway:

❗️As of today, no mainstream consumer platform is known to expose a complete native UI for Matter group management (group creation, adding devices, sending multicast group commands) comparable to what existed with Zigbee or Thread binding.

  • Developer discussions around Home Assistant indicate that Matter scenes and group handling are still under development and not fully exposed to end users.
  • Likewise, platforms such as Google Home or Apple Home do not provide an explicit UI to create Matter groups; they usually rely on scenes or automations instead of native Matter multicast groups.

👉 In practice, this means most users currently cannot:

✅ Add individual devices to a Matter controller
❌ Create and manage Matter groups at the network level
❌ Explicitly send Matter groupcast commands

without relying on automations or workarounds.

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🏗 4) For developers or integrators

If the goal is to build a Matter controller that truly supports Matter groups at the specification level:

  • ESP-Matter Controller (Espressif SDK and examples) explicitly includes commands for group settings (adding/removing groups, managing keysets, binding keysets).
    👉 This is close to a fully featured controller capable of manipulating the Matter “Groups” cluster directly.

This shows that the Matter specification does support group management, but a custom or developer-focused implementation is currently required to expose these features.

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🟡 Summary

Controller Can control Matter devices Native Matter group support
Home Assistant ✔️ ❌ Not fully exposed today
Apple Home / HomePod ✔️ ❌ No explicit Matter groups
Google Home / Nest ✔️ ❌ No explicit Matter groups
Amazon Echo / Alexa ✔️ ❌ No explicit Matter groups
Developer SDKs (ESP-Matter) ✔️ ✔️ Group management APIs available

🧠 Practical conclusion

✔️ Yes, Matter controllers do exist.
✔️ The Matter specification includes a Groups cluster for network-level group management.
❌ Mainstream consumer controllers do not yet provide full, direct management of Matter groups comparable to Zigbee or Z-Wave.

edgy horizon
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@glossy jetty can you please not share ai generated walls of text?

glossy jetty
edgy horizon
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I'd be interested in seeing how well groups actually work in varying network conditions. It actually makes use of ipv6 multicast groups - when a device joins a matter group, it joins a corresponding ipv6 multicast group. It should work to have both wifi and thread devices in a group together - home assistant would send out a multicast message, and it would be picked up by wifi devices directly, and the thread border router would pick it up and forward it to the thread devices in the group.

silver dagger
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In the header you already see Groups, but you can’t do anything with it.

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Whatever ‘is coming soon‘ means… 😃