This is a Blaugust 2026 blog post. I have a moderately sized home automation network, running Home Assistant. I support devices on WiFi, Z-Wave, Zigbee, and Matter/Thread. I am using the Nabu Casa ZBT-2 Thread radio for these devices. Matter has not been a delightful experience. Yet, recently, when I’ve added new devices, I’ve opted for Matter. Initially, I was in pairing hell. New devices almost never added. But I got over that. Turns out that Thread requires IPv6 networking and I had that disabled because my upstream provider doesn’t support it. (Or maybe they do, but only through some VLAN or tunneling contortions.) Once I enabled IPv6 on the local network, that resolved smoothly. So now I’m left with two vexing problems. First, my Ikea MYGGBETT door/window sensor is stuck on firmware version 1.0.9 and won’t accept updates, even though 1.1.4 is available. I’ve seen some mention in the forums that moving to the beta version of the Matter server resolves this. But the device continues to operate – usually – (more in a sec). Updating the server to an unreleased version seems risky. So I’m staying with this – and cursing every time I look at my Home Assistant control panel showing the firmware update is pending. The bigger problem is that my battery powered devices seemingly fall off the network from time to time, never to return. This includes devices from both Eve and Ikea, so I don’t think it’s a vendor issue. None of my other wireless technologies have this problem. The Z-Wave and Zigbee radio antennas sit right next to the Thread antenna, and they work fine. The issue is limited to the Matter/Thread devices. This is a significant problem, because the devices don’t come back without some manual intervention, and automation networks shouldn’t do this. I’ve found that if I reset or power cycle the device, it will come back online … eventually. But it is bothersome that this happens. I am particularly concerned about losing that Ikea MYGGBETT door sensor from my sensor network. It tells me when the pantry door to the garage is open. The cat likes to play out there, and I don’t want to open the garage door if he’s in there. (Franklin is an indoor-only cat.) I am thinking about trying a couple of things. First, my house isn’t big, but the ZBT-2 radio is on the opposite end of the house from the sensor. I’m planning to migrate my smart lightbulbs from Zigbee to Matter. I’m hoping that the always-powered devices will act as radio repeaters, to strengthen the signal. Hopefully that will prevent the door sensor from falling off the network. Second, I’d like to put together an automation that notifies me when an important Matter sensor falls off the network. That way when I check for the “cat in the garage” alert, I could see that the sensor is out. My Matter experience has been frustrating. But it seems like it should get better over time. I don’t plan on expanding my home automation network drastically anytime soon, but I will monitor the market and my home situation, hoping for improvement. And maybe someday, it will all work and I’ll stop hitting myself.