gloomy fossil
I have been looking into Matter as I want to get a smart thermostat and the two zen ZigBee devices I have tried will not pair with ZHA.
It is my understanding that Matter requires an underlying IPv6 network. I know a few friends who have public facing IPv6 from their ISP but no one I know has ever used IPv6 on their own local network (or even sub-network).
Is a local IPv6 network really a hard requirement for using Matter devices? Are average users actually expected to set up an IPv6 network?
upper kestrel
The devices and matter controller just use a link-local IPv6 address, so no need to set up or manage IPv6. As long as all IPv6 traffic is not blocked locally by your router or AP’s.
upper kestrel
That said Relaying IPv6 mDNS can be difficult, which is most everyone recommends either a completely flat network or at least putting HA into the IoT vlan when using Matter.
gloomy fossil
Problem I foresee at this point is a couple of smart plugs that are WiFi only, and I doubt they can do IPv6 so I would need a mixed network (if my wireless router can even do that)
Thanks for the info, gives me. a place to look around for a solution 🙂
wispy stump
In general your wifi router should not make a big difference - matter wifi devices usually support ipv4, and if/when you set up a thread border router, the thread border router will give out local ipv6 addresses for everything on your lan to use to talk to thread devices. You do not need ipv6 internet.
but some people have run into issues where their wifi router would block some of the traffic needed for this to work.
gloomy fossil
I am talking about Matter over WiFi, not Thread, and only dealing with internal home network, not internet facing IPv6 (my home assistant yellow is not reachable from the internet by design anyway)
Many consumer grade WiFi routers cannot handle IPv6 and IPv4 traffic at the same time. I have smart plugs, an EVSE, and an energy monitoring device that cannot do IPv6 so I cannot just switch the router to deal with just IPv6.
My original questions involved the need to set up an IPv6 network inside a home, which I would suggest most people (at least in the US where I am) would have no clue how to do, and that is even assuming their hardware can support it..
You say Matter over WiFi devices usually support IPv4... None that I have looked at so far mention either v4 or v6, is there some code word I should be looking for to verify if a device can somehow do Matter over IPv4?
upper kestrel
So if its a Matter device, the assumption is (or should be) the the Matter firmware can handle matter networking requirements (accept link-local IPv6) and/or accept normal ipv4 dhcp wifi simultaneously. And yes many consumer routers do not have settings to admin IPv6 well, but they also do not block it on the lan side. Prosumer gear has been more problematic it seems for many folk. As they do or allow more granularity with blocking IPv6 or just ability to tweak mDNS flooding.
gloomy fossil
Is there any spec I can look for that would say if it can use IPv4 as well? I am looking at thermostats (Lux TQ1 as example), and worry if they say Matter compatible, they will expect IPv6 when nothing else I have on home network uses it.
upper kestrel
Nothing really out there like that. Do you plan to multi admin with other ecosystems or just Home Assistant?
upper kestrel
Do you see a IPv6 address if you turn on IPv6 in HA?
gloomy fossil
100% HA, 100% local control (HA yellow wire connected to wireless router, which is wire connected through a switch to home server which is then wire connected to cable modem, giving WiFi devices like my phone access to HA but anything else is blocked by wireless router's firewall)
Yes, HA says it has an IPv6 address but no DNS or gateway setting.
Wireless router (GLinet Flint) is currently set up to provide IPv4 addresses, and has a feature switch to turn on IPv6 but that seems to turns off IPv4 services, which are needed for devices wanting to be given IPv4 address