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Zigbee vs. Matter over Thread:Understanding IoT Protocol Performance in Practice

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Re: Zigbee vs. Matter over Thread:Understanding IoT Protocol Performance in Practice

#91

Post by inigyou »

archagon wrote: post #90
torginus wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A bit of clarification: Thread is a layer 2 protocol, for the user, it looks like standard IPv6. Matter is application level, and just expect standard TCP/IP underneath. There's nothing binding Matter to Thread, and in fact a lot of Matter devices use Wifi

I wish we had multimodal Matter devices that could go over Thread or Wi-Fi (or even wired networking) depending on conditions.

We don't want incredibly flexible devices. I think we learned that lesson many times, including with ZigBee. If there's one standard, there's only one standard.

Re: Zigbee vs. Matter over Thread:Understanding IoT Protocol Performance in Practice

#92

Post by bofadeez »

inigyou wrote: post #91
archagon wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish we had multimodal Matter devices that could go over Thread or Wi-Fi (or even wired networking) depending on conditions.

We don't want incredibly flexible devices. I think we learned that lesson many times, including with ZigBee. If there's one standard, there's only one standard.

[flagged]

Re: Zigbee vs. Matter over Thread:Understanding IoT Protocol Performance in Practice

#93

Post by margalabargala »

SEJeff wrote: post #38
margalabargala wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're probably only comparing open protocols. If one doesn't care if their protocol is proprietary then sure one might consider zwave. But it's hardly "surprising" that it's left out.

What? The entire specification is in this git repo maintained by the home assistant team. Also, they’re on the zwave board now. It’s wholly open, but wasn’t maybe 4-5 years ago. https://github.com/zwave-js/specs

Source available is not the same as open. Source available does not mean non-proprietary.

Just like HDMI, if you want to build a device that uses Zwave, you must pay for the privilege.

Re: Zigbee vs. Matter over Thread:Understanding IoT Protocol Performance in Practice

#94

Post by inigyou »

bofadeez wrote: post #92
inigyou wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't want incredibly flexible devices. I think we learned that lesson many times, including with ZigBee. If there's one standard, there's only one standard.

[flagged]

Is this a troll?

Re: Zigbee vs. Matter over Thread:Understanding IoT Protocol Performance in Practice

#96

Post by XiS »

8fingerlouie wrote: post #81
XiS wrote: post #58

`establishing it as a more robust foundation for larger and more heterogeneous deployments.` Based on.... 6 devices? Quite honestly I would have been interested in measurements with more than only 6 devices. Maybe upto 50 or so,even better if they'd mixed different hardware nodes for a more realistic scenario

I have 47 thread/matter devices, alongside some 10-15 matter over wifi devices, so not quite 50, but "close enough". It's not as fast as Zigbee, not in day to day usage, and not in terms of reconnecting, which often takes 30 seconds (ie. after a power outage) where my Zigbee devices just seem to reconnect instantly. On day to day usage there's a slight delay when turning something on, but it's maybe 100ms or less. I…

Thank you for giving some insight on your experiences I practice with that amount of devices.

I have a zigbew network running with around 55 devices current. Ever since matter over thread I'm wondering whether I should start making the switch.

Tell me, what made you start migrating to Matter? General availability of hardware, latency, stability, something else?

Re: Zigbee vs. Matter over Thread:Understanding IoT Protocol Performance in Practice

#97

Post by close04 »

jnovacho wrote: post #76
close04 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For IPv6 networks you're in luck. The hubs are not proxies so the IPv6 enabled IoT device in an IPv6 network can still be blocked at firewall level from accessing the internet. Less that the separation Zigbee provides but better than nothing. For IPv4 networks you're out of luck. The internal mesh traffic is still IPv6 to the hub and anything crossing into the IPv4 network is done through the hub's IP. No more blocki…

Firewall blocking is not the point. The point is, that over time through enshitiffication the new device will require call home to unlock. Even when it does not need internet to work at all. But through this the vendor will get a foothold. Sure you can block it, but then you have a pricey paperweight. This is not unique to Thread/Matter, they can pull the rug on ZigBee as well, ofc.

> through enshitiffication the new device will require call home to unlock

I thought Matter certification demands that the device work without cloud connectivity, it's part of the spec. Being able to use any hub and have guaranteed basic functionality without the cloud is the big selling point.

> This is not unique to Thread/Matter, they can pull the rug on ZigBee as well, ofc.

Exactly. Enshittification can't be prevented with technical means, a manufacturer looking to rentseek can always do something shady to force your hand no matter the technology. These are by definition smart and connected devices, there are plenty of avenues for abuse. Philips tried to push an app update that required you to log in to an account to manage your Zigbee Hue hub and devices. They'll try again.

Thread/Matter are on paper mostly good for the consumers but come with some potential drawbacks. No smart home technology eliminates these risks, they only balance different advantages and drawbacks.

> but then you have a pricey paperweight.

The device must work offline. You might lose some features though, usually the ones that are only supported via the proprietary app.

Re: Zigbee vs. Matter over Thread:Understanding IoT Protocol Performance in Practice

#98

Post by 8fingerlouie »

XiS wrote: post #96
8fingerlouie wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have 47 thread/matter devices, alongside some 10-15 matter over wifi devices, so not quite 50, but "close enough". It's not as fast as Zigbee, not in day to day usage, and not in terms of reconnecting, which often takes 30 seconds (ie. after a power outage) where my Zigbee devices just seem to reconnect instantly. On day to day usage there's a slight delay when turning something on, but it's maybe 100ms or less. I…

Thank you for giving some insight on your experiences I practice with that amount of devices. I have a zigbew network running with around 55 devices current. Ever since matter over thread I'm wondering whether I should start making the switch. Tell me, what made you start migrating to Matter? General availability of hardware, latency, stability, something else?

Initially it was just curiosity when thread/matter was new. Back then it was a horrible experience, but I was using primarily HomeKit as my home automation platform (which only supports thread) and didn't have that much complexity. I was also using a bunch of vendor specific apps to control each individual vendors ecosystem.

Fast forward some years and I had my share of vendor specific ecosystems be shut down, leaving me with a bunch of technically fine paperweights, which was when I started focusing on local first access. I didn't want to be locked in by yet another vendor, and I was still using HomeKit as my main platform (still not very advanced home automation), so thread/matter came naturally.

What really turned things around was when I purchased a Homey Pro in 2022/2023. I could integrate pretty much everything locally, and expose it to HomeKit to the "control surface" my family used, which is when I started using Zigbee more (only had Hue before that).

These days I'm running Home Assistant. The Homey Pro became too small, frequently running out of memory, and switching to Home Assistant opened a whole new set of doors with ESPHome and others, like gaining control of my Vaillant Heat pump thought an ESP32 [1], or reading the wmBus telegrams from my water meter.

My "main criteria" at the moment is not so much if it's thread, zigbee, or wifi, but heavily focused on local control. I'm only buying devices that have local access. I'm fine with devices offering an optional cloud plan, like my Tado X TRVs, but I must be able to access them locally from HA.

I still default to thread/matter where possible as to not have too many things going at once, and I have zero Z-Wave devices.

[1]: https://adapter.ebusd.eu/v5-c6/index.en.html

Re: Zigbee vs. Matter over Thread:Understanding IoT Protocol Performance in Practice

#99

Post by montjoy »

SEJeff wrote: post #24
asveikau wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn't zwave use a different frequency, and zigbee and thread are both 2.4ghz? Perhaps that makes it a more fair comparison?

Yes, zwave is in the much less congested 900mhz range. It is a fair bit more reliable as it doesn’t compete with: - WiFi - Bluetooth - microwave ovens Additionally, it’s a bit more strict with certification so you can easily use multiple vendors for zwave whereas with zigbee it’s often a terrible experience since vendors implement things differently in ways that are not as interoperable. In fact, for a device to be c…

Also, Z-wave’s frequency is a bit better at handling things like metal electrical boxes - useful if you live in an older home.

Anecdotally, I have Z-wave, Zigbee, and WiFi devices. Z-wave and WiFi are far more reliable than zigbee.

Re: Zigbee vs. Matter over Thread:Understanding IoT Protocol Performance in Practice

#100

Post by baby_souffle »

hiitsmyaccount wrote: post #18
baby_souffle wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've helped lots of people with home automation Network build outs l; the biggest factor is the RF environment. If you're fortunate enough to not be battery constrained at most endpoints and can put a high quality Wi-Fi access point in an optimal location than Wi-Fi is incredibly reliable. The tooling for inspecting all layers of a Wi-Fi network is infinitely more accessible and mature and that certainly helps; I can…

I have a Unifi home network with two Wifi 7 access points and gigabit ethernet. For home automation, I went with ZWave and do not regret it at all. It's been rock solid and I've never felt the need to get a dongle to debug the traffic. I don't want to be working through all of the WiFi baggage with my home automation devices. I recently introduced some Zigbee bulbs (hue and cheapos from Amazon) and they've been mostl…

> For home automation, I went with ZWave and do not regret it at all. It's been rock solid and I've never felt the need to get a dongle to debug the traffic.

That's because zwave requires everything go through certification process. You pay more for this, but things generally just work.

It's an entirely different situation in zigbee land though.

I stick with ESPHome and MQTT because I can inspect and modify the behaviors of everything with free and open tools.

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