Since the 16.5 upgrade, my HomeKit stopped working. I called eero, called Apple, and no one could figure it out. I too had to rebuild my home and it took me a long time, so I am so happy that you posted this video because I thought I was the only one that had to do it. Apple needs to do better.
I have experienced exactly this in the last 48 hours. Ended up in the same place, total homekit reset and rebuild. I only have 20 or so devices, but the pain is real. Thanks for taking the time to get it in front of Apple engineering and applying a little pressure with this video. In a twisted way, I’m actually kind of glad you and others are having the same problem. Would have sucked to learn there was one setting I missed and I nuked the whole system for nothing. Now we can hope Apple will give some ability to prioritize home hubs and exclude devices that want to be a hub, but can’t.
Yikes. The wife and I jUst moved from apartment to townhome. Stuck with Spectrum as our ISP, but in the apartment, internet was provided and of course couldn’t be taken with. Once internet was installed at the townhome, I learned it was fiber, so the MoCa adapters I got were not needed ‘cause the coax ports were useless. When it came to reinstalling everything, my 3rd Gen. ATV 4K connected to the WiFi and my new home with no problems, but everything else I had to reset (HomePod minis, couple smart plugs, few Nanoleaf A19’s). So far, so good. Have also added Ecobee Lite’s that came with the home and most recently an Aqara U100, and everything is going great. Thankfully I never had to go past the ol’ ‘Reset’ step!
I had the dreaded no response to all devices happen once. This was about a year and half ago. Had to rebuild my smart home from the ground up. Recently with the new architecture update, my wife wasn’t able to view anything. After three hours and fifteen minutes on the phone with Apple, I saw a post on Reddit where someone linked a profile which would allow the user to nuke their HomeKit data. I ended up doing that on her phone and then I reignited her and it worked fine. Apple support still has a ticket pending follow up with me on how to resolve it. I agree with you that Apple support can be very frustrating at times.
Same issues here. Eventually one day things started adding for no apparent reason. They need to put “Matter” back in the oven it still has a lot of baking left. My Nanoleaf bulbs are dumb now they never work reliably and eventually go non responsive. I’ve learned to avoid all matter and it sucks because Nanoleaf was my favorite. Kudos to Belkin for not jumping onto Matter like the rest.
I’ve never been a WeMo fan but maybe they were actually onto something there… I have no doubt things will get better, I just hope it’s soon. I’ve been having some reliability issues with my Matter Nanoleaf bulbs as well.
I have the exact same issue when the ‘Connected’ hub is not a thread border router, then thread devices tend to lose their connection. After power cycling the Connected hub, another device becomes the Connected hub and that generally fixes the problem for a while, even though the new connected hub may not have thread. All my hubs are Apple devices. Very disappointing that Apple has not addressed this after so many months. At a minimum, they could prioritize their thread border routers to be the ‘Connected’ hubs so that older non-thread hubs are avoided.
Hi. Reaching out from the Cayman Islands!!! I had the issue of several of my devices not responding. It was soo frustrating. I had issues adding the new matter nano leaf bulbs as well. A lot of my devices are now responding. I was able to eventually add the nano leaf bulbs as well; however, they are not very responsive. Thank you for sharing this vid. I know that I am not alone.
Because there's so many parts of the system that can create these issues, its very much a Gordian knot to untangle some times! I have to commend you on your calm conveyance of your frustration and commitment to solving the problem even though it was ultimately a very painful fix/workaround.
Thanks A LOT for taking the time to explain and document all of this in your video. I was halfway in the process (but with MEROSS support not apple) with no better success. It saved me valuable time to watch and learn from your tests, they were so close to mine :-) I ended up doing exatly what you did and .... VOILà it solved everything. Thanks again.
I’ve had my Apple Home give me the no response on many or all devices more often lately. I’m hoping not to have to go and delete it all but it’s good to know all the steps you took. Thanks for posting your experience.
I’ve had to nuke and re-create my smart home before, so I feel your pain. 150+ smart home items, dozens and dozens of automations and scenes… it’s painful!
I have been experiencing stability and performance issues since the last update, and possibly from the update prior to that one. Something that I had noticed in the past was that the Apple TV being used as a hub would cause sluggish response. In the past I solved this by configuring the Apple TV’s not to act as hubs and all was good as the HomePods took the load very well. I just noticed you can no longer remove Apple TV’s from the hubs!!! Apple added them all back in and I am convinced that a lot of my issues come from this move.
Brad, I’m both most sorry (said in the best Canadian accent I can muster) that you had to go through this and yet happy it was you given your penchant for turning lemons into lemon aid. You’ve got a great set of tips here. When I first started my Apple Home, I could not get any of my devices to take on what Apple refers to as a personal request (accessing app data on your iPhone or iPad, such as calendar, phone calls, or even texting). I use Siri all the time so this drove me nuts. I also eventually worked with Apple customer support and had someone take ownership of the case. This is what people should ask for once they reach their third person. I have forgotten his name by now, but even just the psychological relief from him saying that he’s taking ownership and will be with me until this is resolved was a big relief. It ended up being a security feature I had turned on after watching one of those UA-cam videos on”…10 settings you must turn off now on your iPhone!” Like many of us, I also became massively frustrated with my Apple Home randomly and often nonsensically changing my home hub. After reading various ideas, I manually selected my hub by unplugging all 22 home hubs, waiting for 20 minutes, and then reconnecting the power on my desired hub. Viola! Even after turning the rest back on, it stuck with the first home hub. That’s when I went fully crazy. I bought 20 Eve SmartPlugs and connected every home hub to a SmartPlug. I then programmed a series of scenes to power down all of the hubs in the middle of the night. With so many hubs, I learned that you cannot get away with one scene and the final scenes make a north to south column in my house: first row is the west side with all hubs in that north/south column, then the middle row of west to east, and finally all hubs on the east. I leave on my desired hub that is an Apple TV 4K located almost perfectly central in my home and is connected via Ethernet. All hubs are then brought back up 20 minutes after the last row of hubs is taken down. The result? It works like a charm. I have had this same hub as the only hub I ever see flagged as my connected hub for over 2 months. It can take some time, and WAY too many Eve SmartPlugs, but you can wrest control back from Apple!
Thanks Dr. Cole! I’m glad I learned from this process and hope it helps others in some small way. Wow, That’s some serious dedication to selecting your home hub! Take that Apple! As always, Appreciate your support!!
That’s insane. But I totally understand it. My home is small. I have a robust three Eero Pro 6 and an Eero Pro 5 wifi network. The Internet originates from one end of the house through wifi to the other EP6s. My newest Apple TV 4K is connected via Ethernet to an EP6 and is in the center of the house. But for some reason, Apple keeps electing the Apple TV HD, the oldest device which is the furthest from the Internet origin, connected only via WiFi, as the Home Hub. I’m convinced it’s why the HomeKit Secure video has such issues. I wish Apple would allow ME to elect which devices may be Home Hubs. They seem to be bad at it.
That’s insane. But I totally understand it. My home is small. I have a robust three Eero Pro 6 and an Eero Pro 5 wifi network. The Internet originates from one end of the house through wifi to the other EP6s. My newest Apple TV 4K is connected via Ethernet to an EP6 and is in the center of the house. But for some reason, Apple keeps electing the Apple TV HD, the oldest device which is the furthest from the Internet origin, connected only via WiFi, as the Home Hub. I’m convinced it’s why the HomeKit Secure video has such issues. I wish Apple would allow ME to elect which devices may be Home Hubs. They seem to be bad at it.
Matter connectivity standard is going to be on IPv6 standard. Right now, most ISPs do support IPv6. But you may want to contact them and ensure your modem is IPv6. The. Your router would also have to have the ability to switch to IPv6. Once this is figured out, all your devices that connect via WiFi would have to be reconnected to your network under the IPv6 connectivity standard.
I’m having almost the same exact issue currently. Only difference is I can add matter devices but the all it says is “No Response” did all the same steps and test as you and on a test home it works. Now i’m just procrastinating, deleting my primary home and creating a new one. It’s sad and sucks to have to do it. Done it 3 times throughout the lifespan of Apple HomeKit. It’s just been awhile and I have double the amount of accessories that I did the last time I did it. Wish me luck! Haha
I’ve had my Home reset to a previous version 3 or 4 times, deleting any new accessory added after a certain date. One weird thing was that an old iPad that was not a “Resident” account could still see and control all the accessories. Likely also corrupted memory after talking to support. HomePass codes were also deleted for any new device so that was useless. Same with the Controller app “backup”. The solution was to call Apple as soon as it happens again so they can get some logs. AKA no solution, though it hasn’t happened in a while so maybe it was fixed in an update. What I did to make things a little easier next time was to take a photo of all HK codes and label them in my notes app in case I have to rebuild my home again. Folders with the individual rooms made it organized for me.
Very well done video. I've had numerous problems with Home over the years, but not like you. I have over 175 devices in one home so my worst Home Nightmare is rebuilding an Apple Home......
I “upgraded” my eve energy to matter and it completely bricked the device. It will not pair to Homekit no matter how many times I’ve tried. Eve owes me money for my broken product and my wasted time.
I appreciate you sharing this story. This sort of thing drives me bonkers. I recently bought my first HomePod-- the mini. It worked perfectly for a few days, but then out of the blue it no longer responds to my Siri shortcuts. Your situation sounded far worse.
Yes, I set up an automation that’s triggered by an NFC tag near my back door that runs a script that will lock or unlock the door according to its state and announce that it’s doing so. It worked great until it suddenly stopped working. Then three hours later, the door kept cycling the lock as all the failed requests went through. VERY VERY weird, annoying, and insecure since what if the last state left the door unlocked and I wasn’t home? You’d think these requests would be time stamped and expire. But apparently not.
Brad, you most certainly earn the award for persistence! Thank you for posting this video. I had no success with two matter products that I eventually returned. I did all of the things you did save involve Apple. One fix I attempted but was unsuccessful is to ENTIRELY delete that app I loaded onto my iPhone, in order to reload, start entirely over. The app was persistent in iCloud. How do I entirely delete an app so that it no longer exists anywhere in Apple's iCloud or anywhere else? Thanks to all who may try to help me with this.
I know your pain! Because of that I move to Home Assistant and added Homekit acessories to Home assistant and now i'm very satisfied. Works like a charm in 99% of time and have the possibility of doing more complex automations. Btw, I have the same problem than you with Hub 2. The problem is apple leading with matter. Hub 2 works good in home assistant
I have the same issue. Unfortunately, I also tried to add a new home with a different router and a HomePod 2nd gen as a border router but had no luck. I have tried with Eve Energy Switch, Nanoleaf A19 bulbs, SwitchBot Hub 2 and WIZ Hero lamp and same result. I don’t know for now what else to try…. Thanks for your video.
Wouldn't it be nice if Apple would keep backups of the Home, and let you restore to them. So that if the home setting .plist or whatever got corrupted, you could just say "this is broken, let's try a previous version that worked pretty well" so you don't have to build the whole thing again. I have a lot of automations that are running continuously (creating a watch-dog timer that watches for devices going non-resonsive, and internet connectivity issues to reboot my modem) and rebuilding all of that from scratch would be rough.
I don't feel so bad with my smarthome problems, and I'm not even using Matter or Thread. The technology is just not ready for PrimeTime. I could NOT pair a $300 EVE outdoor floodlight cam. It said the pairing code was incorrect, but the sticker on the manual and the light said differently. I never got it to work and EVE was useless.
I’ve had my home corrupt twice, the first time, like you I worked with Apple and got no answer and ended up with a semi functional home for a while until they ran out of road and I took the plunge, second time i began to notice some serious weirdness, did the same as you and set up another experiment home, worked properly, so I just blew the whole thing away and started again, fortunately it’s not happened for a while and I’m not going anywhere near matter until I have to. The lack of advanced configuration features in homekit is a curse as well as a blessing as when it just works it’s great, but equally when something begins to misbehave, or when you could do with forcing something and you can’t it’s a real problem.
Such a great point on the lack of configuration features.... Great in some ways, but frustrating in others, especially when there is a problem. Matter will get better we just need to be patient.
I unfortunately had to Nuke my apple home a few months ago and I agree that the process, while absolutely frustrating, ended up making my entire smart home so much better after recreating it with all the experience I’ve gained over the years.
I hear you, things can get pretty cluttered over the years. I would love to see Apple create a backup and restore option right in HomeKit. Thanks for watching!
I have to give Switchbot credit where it's due, their products aren't rock solid but if they can't resolve the issue they are very prompt to issue a replacement. Had the same experience with my curtains when it was bricked by an update.
Most users won't experience this more than once, but it may be worth sharing. If you're moving, even if it's a local move and your home is going to be set up in the same exact configuration (room names, zones, etc.), be prepared to rebuild your entire Apple Home when you do, including factory resetting all of your Apple home devices. In my experience, once you create a home in Apple Home/HomeKit, it's geo-locked with no way to change it, and you can't even reuse an old home name. Unlike Brad's situation, you'll also have to do this for some 1st party devices that use hubs, which also requires resetting all linked/child devices. Also, have a new email address for those 1st party apps that force you to create a new account when you move. I'll spare the long troubleshooting process for brevity and your time, but I will say it was a similar level as Brad's.
Had a similar issue a year ago, same results from Apple. They had no idea what’s the issue was other than a corrupt file somewhere in the HomeKit settings. I Apples defenses I don’t think they can much. Think about how many users they have, how many different variables there are for everyone’s home set up. There can’t be a way to have that many experts to cover that many variants. But every time I have had something relative simple to fix they have been SO on it!
Agree Steve, it''s hard to blame Apple Support. It's just the reality of the situation. I would love to see an option within HomeKit to backup and restore, this could be helpful for these types of situations. Thanks for watching!
I had a nightmare when I updated to new HomeKit architecture. It didn’t fully fix until 16.4 or .5. I can feel your pain. I have over 140 different devices. Building a new home would be catastrophic. I have separated HomePod OG to a new home or thread and matter devices are unreliable. I wish Apple put more priority in HomeKit software to make improvements. This is low priority for them.
I had this same issue. Updated to new architecture in 2022 when it was first available and everything went unresponsive. I had the same frustrating issues with apple support and it took over six months of back and forth with them before the decided it was a corrupt database issue on their servers and had to rebuild from scratch. The hours I spent with them deleting unrelated apps and trying different WiFi systems was really terrible. After my full home rebuild which they said was the only fix, I now have the “ghost home hub” bug where a nonexistent home hub shows as not responding permanently. Very frustrating.
Sometimes I love doing a full reset because it then gets rid of unused or duplicate scenes and automations. It could be good if you don't have many but I get your frustration of having a large amount!
I have been VERY frustrated with matter. I got the more expensive Apple TV 4K to get that ethernet port and get a home hub. I then got Nanoleaf matter bulbs and other devices. I'm not going to go through all the details. Sooooo many issues. And I run my own business. I do not have time for this. I want to pay $$$ for good tech and then I just want it to work! Honestly, I'm not even sure what to do. Nanoleaf has terrible customer care. I'll try some of the solutions you have mentioned.... when I have time....
It's still very early and Matter and Apple have a long way to go. The original Nanoleaf essentials are currently much more reliable than the Matter version. Not Nanoleafs fault (I don't believe), it's an issue with Matter, and how it's managed in Apple Home. it will get better, but it's hard to just wait when you've already spent the money on these devices.
@@TheBradLloyd Thank you for the reply. I was waiting months to get the Nanoleafs with Matter and, I'll be honest, I had high expectations. Hopefully the issues will be resolved.
Hey Brad, thanks for the great video showing that they can be issues with Apple Home. I have a similar issue but with just Philips Hue. This weekend I plan to erase everything Hue and start again. This will suck as I have 21 hue lights and accessories. Wish me luck!
Great discussion. Thanks, Brad, for sharing. I've concluded that the experience we have here is the norm and is not going to radically improve any time soon. The reason is the technology is constantly changing. Thus, the price of investing in home automation is we need to be competent troubleshooters. Don't install more complexity than you can troubleshoot. I know, that's easier said than done but it's a warning that just because we can have a home automation capability does not mean we should add it. A key part of system maintenance is documentation of our installation. I like to think I'm pretty good in this regard, but I'm learning I need to rethink my documentation system. It has evolved over the years and is too fractured and incomplete. If anyone has a template for documenting home automation installations, I'm interested. I went through an exercise recently concerning if we sell the house, how should we handle the home automation capabilities? After a lot of discussion and scenario modelling, I concluded all home automation functionality needs to be removed. Devices like light switches that can default function to a manual mode can stay, but all hubs will be removed, Wired and WiFi network removed, and the smart functions that any remaining devices are capable of are disabled. If the new owner wants home automation, he will have to build it from scratch. I would prefer to not take this approach because I believe home automation adds real value to the home. Unfortunately, the value added if more than offset by the downside of leaving it in place.
I don’t plan to sell my home, but if I did, I’d probably discuss it with the new buyers. We use Lutron lighting, so all that could stay and they can either use it as is or they could reset up the hub and do their own thing. The beauty of Lutron Caseta is that anyone who encounters it can figure out basic functionality very quickly. Home automation customizations are too personal I think. I’d leave things like window and door sensors and smart locks in place. I opted for Level Home Bolt locks so they work just like normal locks. I’d probably replace the thermostat with a cheap non-smart version, or the one that was there before I replaced it, if I could find it.
Yup, deleted my home in the myQ app because the bridge was a pain, it deleted my HomeKit home as well, had to rebuild from scratch. Apple tech was worthless I ended up explaining to the adviser and teaching him, he didn’t even know what Matter was. Very similar situation to Brad’s. I have also noticed adding any product lately is more tedious that it was in the past…
Yikes! That is a weird one.... I've actually had issues adding myQ back since rebuilding. I'm thinking of switching to Meross. I find that adding new HomeKit devices seems to take longer than before as well. Fine with me though, as long as it works!
same experience its crazy how much time we spent on trying to fix shit from these billion and trillion $ company's. I switched from Google Home to Apple Home its just the same shit and unreliable. I cant hear it anymore, to restart or reset from any support. I am at the point where I am just waiting that shit is fixing itself and hopefully SW updates make it work in the future, frankly it only can get better. So what you do if the issues starting again? you completely redo everything again? come on, that cant be the solution.
Stuff like this is what will keep home automation in a niche. The big problem is the utter lack of transparency of what is happening (or not happening). The lack of user accessible logging makes tracking down problems nearly impossible. Instead of finding out where it’s failing you have to do shit like in this video. We need to demand better from the tech industry. The whole “It just works!” ethos of their deign falls flat when it doesn’t work. Instead of having clues you can use to figure out how to fix it, you get an ever-growing list of busy work to do. And a LOT of that busy work is arduous as it requires totally redoing things, not because that will actually fix it, but because it MIGHT fix it. Who knows, until you try? That’s truly terrible design and the average consumer will not tolerate this.
When you decided to wipe your Home, did you use the HomeKit reset file? It’s essentially a file that completely wipes your HomeKit home. Resets your data in your keychain, removes all homes, and anything that might not be visible but is contributing to the inconsistencies. I’ve had a HomeKit since it’s release, so I imagine any issues I have is related to this old stale data we cant even see.
I did not, I just deleted it. It generally seemed to fix the problem though, so I guess it worked. Good tip on the reset file, though hopefully I never have to worry about that!
Hi Brad great video I have a consistent problem with all my home hubs (9) disconnecting and reconnecting and thus I cannot control my home externally I am going to try and disconnect my two older Apple TV’s and see if this helps - tks
If this is any help to others my nearly 9 month issue with Home app connectivity was resolved immediately by disconnecting the two apple tv’s in my home. Apple support have been no help in all this time. Tks Brad
I still have some problem with some matter devices were Apple's home app will claim that it cannot contact the devices, and yet the very same Apple device (my iPad) will instantly report any notifications which come from that device. Eric Welander just posted a video where he notes that some devices which support Matter _(and do not have direct support for Apple Home)_ really prefer to speak over iPv6 instead of IPv4. Thus people might experience problems if their home network is setup to be mostly IPv4 without much thought to IPv6. That describes my home network, so my guess is that I should take the time to setup all my network devices to be as IPv6-ish as possible. I'm not looking forward to that!
I’m having this issue with a new smartwing blind that replaced an old one that was making noise. I can’t seem to be able to add it to HomeKit 🤦🏽♂️ I have two more and those are working just fine
That’s odd… Make sure to factory reset first by pressing and holding for 6 seconds. Should jog up/down 3 times in total I believe. If you are still having trouble, then reach out to Smartwings. Perhaps they sent the wrong HomeKit code….?
Thank you The Brad Lloyd. These are GREAT TIPS! I have been having similar troubles with Home App and my accessories, and similar responses or non responses from Apple agents. I even had the same questions, is it my wi-fi? (I added another mesh router and it seems things got worse.) Is it an OS update? Is it a Home Hub? Is it my wi-fi provider? Have I exceeded the max number of accessories for my mesh system? My patience is shorter and is waning. Might be an age thing, lol. THE STRUGGLE CONTINUES! New question, should this be a struggle?
Sounds like you have quite the situation... It's hard to know the root cause of your problem. Usually your router will say how many devices it supports, so good to check for that. Another question would be if the issue is HomeKit in general, or just wifi issues? Backing up and re building may be the answer. I hate suggesting it, but at a certain point it's the only option, and the fresh start can be nice.
What a frustrating situation, but it looks like you came out the other end all the wiser! This video is an amazing guide for troubleshooting any Apple Home issue and I'll definitely be referring back to it. Thanks!
I had a critical homekit bug introduced by a factory reset of my Apple TV 4K and it broke the entire thing. Everything stopped working, showing not accessible. I tried literally everything and had the exact same experience as you, just different issue. This was after they “fixed” the new architecture. So basically homekit is great everything, but apple has a complete garbage software here full of bugs, their team thinks it’s acceptable to just default to “have you tried resetting everything and resetting it up for an entire day of your life.” The lack of backup is crazy. Really an annoying aspect of apple and one of the worst product lines from them imo. Could be great eventually, but if I have to reset everything for a third time I’m gonna loose it.
Good video as always as I’m having big matter problems. I just bought a 3 pack of Nanoleaf bulbs and after getting the first one in no problem but the second one wouldn’t go into my ecosystem as it says closed for security 😢
Great video… thanks! What a painful spell you’ve had… thanks for making us aware of potential ’Matter’ related change-over issues… I can see the frustration in your face and the irritation in your voice. I don’t have nearly as much smart stuff as you (some Nanoleaf bulbs and some Eve plugs) but even these go wonky once in a while. Luckily my problems usually resolve with a simple reset (to the light bulbs) or sometimes simply ignoring them and they eventually return to work properly again. I have not switched to ‘Matter’ and do not intend to do so at this time. I have only Apple stuff and plan to continue that way. Also, I read that once you switch to Matter on your devices there is no going back.
OMG! Total Dèja Vu! I could have done this exact video. Add the fact that I installed the latest beta to fix the issue but then Apple Support wouldn’t help me after that… so, uninstalled beta and went back… Great video and thanks for doing it… although it was “trauma triggering” and I was clenching my jaw the whole time.
Sorry you had to go through that as well… Beta updates can be tricky because sometimes it can have a fix to a known issue, but it’s also a “use at your own risk” thing, so then Apple won’t help. Hopefully this is the last major issue we have to go through….
In terms of Apple Home, all devices would be controlled by your primary Hub at that particular time. Standby hubs can relay info to each other, but the "primary" is doing the work.
I'm currently found myself in a soup of HomeKit (meross), Hue, Govee, Smartthings, and freaking google nest, thanks to these companies spotty and changed promises on HomeKit support, so I'm looking forward to Matter, and trying to not buy ANYTHING until it's finalized, this make me so mad. it's such a pain in the ass. I wish I could start over and go 100% hue and HomeKit. I was this close to covering to Caseta, but it was a worthless journey without colored lighting, so I stayed with Hue and Meross (Meross because it's 1/15th the cost for RGBH bulbs)
It will get better, it has to. We knew there would be some growing pains..... For reliability Hue and Lutron are top notch. Meross isn't at that level but like you said, for the price it's good enough.
Have you since received an answer? The past two weeks my matter Meross smart plug, habitat c-8 hub, Aqara Motion Sensor P2, and Wiz wifi bulbs are nonresponsive. There are still many accessories that work including the lights in my home from Philips hue and Lutron with the hubs, my Logitec circleview doorbell works, my eve outdoor cameras, and Schlage lock, plus the HomeKit version of the Meross smart plugs. My husband's Android phone indicated IPv6, but my iPhone didn't show a router number for IPv6. I then went to the router and enabled IPv6, restarted the internet, unplugged and restarted all accessories and hubs, and restarted my phone. Still no response from those same devices, I then deleted an Aqara P2 motion sensor from HomeKit and tried to add it back via Matter. It can see the device but it's stuck on the connecting screen over and over. Any current suggestions to troubleshoot for any of those items? I'd hate to also have to rebuild my home.
The unfortunate TL;DR is :: smart home house of cards falls down so let's build another house of cards. My take is this type of hobby is TOO time intensive and effort for me, and I'm retired. I think I'll stick with my ultra simple smart home set up for now...
Not being able to pick primary hub is a pain. I think I would want ethernet connection to my primary. Was thinking about switching to apple for smart home, but may wait
My problem is not being able to designate the main Matter hub and some backups (in an order I choose is very annoying. I have two 4K Apple TVs and an HD Apple TV. And the HD, which doesn’t support Matter or Thread, always wants to jump to the head of the queue was screwing with my Thread and Matter devices. Plus my HomePod Mini pair always tries to wrest control from my Gen. 2 HomePod pair. I can reboot something and it will pass the control to something else, but everything reboots eventually. So my AppleTV solution is to force the HD to not be eligible to be a hub at all, ever. I have six other devices, so that’s not a problem. But there’s no reason to not let us choose. At least those of us who know what we’re doing. Apple needs to seriously commit to this.
I'm with you.... If there is no way for us to choose then Apple needs to improve the reliability so it doesn't matter (no pun intended). In theory it should matter if your non-thread device is the primary, but I'm having this issue as well.
I’m not familiar with home assistant but could all of this have been way easier to handle if you had everything integrated via home assistant as your main controller for apple home? Matter is just plagued with bogus implementations from each manufacturer even though its a “standard”. My nanoleaf essentials A19s are horrible, they keep losing all the settings as far as colors or temperature, no adaptive lighting with matter and circadian lighting implementation from nanoleaf is garbage and just keeps resetting to default scenes.
Great video Brad. I'm so sorry you spent hundreds of hours on this - hopefully Apple now realises it needs to invest more into HomeKiit. Do you think it's best to connect all hubs & bridges on the 2.4Ghz frequency? And can you access these if your phone is on the 5Ghz frequency?
What a pain the a…. ! I feel you bro . This happen to me as well , I had to erase my home and started adding all of my devices from my home. Took me a few hours as well since I have so many smart things 😵💫 support was no help , I can even tech them about Home and settings 😂
I am surprised by two things in this video: 1) that you didn’t have a test Home already for testing new HomeKit/Matter products 2) that you created the test home that late in the troubleshooting game No hate or anything, just not what I expected I guess. I have steered very clear of Matter products for this very reason long before the release of your video.
Wasn't Eve the only brand that screwed up their firmware so that devices couldn't be commissioned with Matter using an Iphone? I guess their firmware upgrade to Matter did give them Android compatibility. #Matterishere I've had great success with every matter device out of the box. Some bad firmware with Eve and early Hue versions. Now Eve and Hue's firmware works great and all my matter devices work smoothly out of the box. The great thing now Philips Hue works and bridges any Zigbee brand to Apple Home and other Matter platforms. No need to buy $50 Hue bulbs.
I had to nuke my home and start over again when I changed my WiFi and used a different SSID and password. I tried to just change it in the manufacturer's app. Some devices would let me and some would not. I ended up getting so frustrated that I nuked it all and started over from scratch. It made a world of difference. One thing that saved me a lot of grief is all of my light switches were Lutron Caseta (42 total). Once I added the hub back to the new home, all of the lights reappeared in the correct rooms. My Aqara hubs (6 Camera hubs, 3 security hubs, 49 child devices) added back all of the child devices but put them into the room that the hub was in. I had luckily named all of my devices unique names and was able to figure out where to put them back at. My WiFi devices had to all be factory reset and added back one at a time. I have 49 client devices using WiFi and Ethernet. I also have a large Thread network (21 Eve devices, 2 Nanoleaf bulbs). So not nearly as many devices as you but it was still quite painful. I can empathize with you on what you had to go through to do this. It took me a full two days to get all of my devices added back. I then had to go through all of my shortcuts and fix them as they were missing the devices I was using in IF statements. The scene names were all still there so that is another reason to use scenes in automations and not use individual devices. I had a spreadsheet with everything documented, including each rooms scenes and Personal and Home automations, as well as Shortcuts. After about a week, I had everything working again. The only outstanding issue I have is that I cannot read my Honeywell T-6 Lyric thermostat. I was able to add it to my Lutron app and can set the temperature there. I cannot set it in the Honeywell app which is a piece of trash. I am planning on replacing it with an ecoBee thermostat in the near future.
I feel your pain Brad when it comes to contacting apple support regarding Apple home. You literally have to educate the reps on how Apple home works. Very frustrating. I’ll never forget the rep saying, “wow you are an apple home power user. I can finally tell someone that it’s possible.” SMH. Glad everything is up and back running.
No idea what happened with my Apple Home. One day when I asked Siri to turn on a light, she responded with something like, "You need to have Smart Home devices installed first!" I couldn't remove items from my smart Home first, so some things would behave really weirdly because they thought they were installed in 2 houses. Eventually I had to reset everything back to its factory setting. I don't have a lot of smart home devices, but it still took me AGES! We used to ask Siri to control lights all the time, now we control most things on the home app. The reason being Siri often asks, "Who is speaking?" We removed Siri from the Home app and our iPhones etc and completely started afresh, including toggling Siri's access to iCloud off, then back on again. Meh!…it has never been the same since before the reset. My Eve Door and Window contact sensors sometimes don't seem to work since migrating them to work with Matter. 😢
Sounds pretty brutal..... Siri is..... ok, but needs a lot of work. I find the larger the smart home the worse Siri gets because it's hard to clearly differentiate between various device names and scenes. I haven't had many issues with the "recognize my voice" feature, but you could aways turn it off. It's helpful for personal requests like different family members sensing messages or adding to reminders etc. I haven't upgraded my Eve Door and Window to Matter yet, but I will. Matter still isn't solid, but I expect it will only get better.
I hate the “it just works” philosophy from Apple. They still like to believe that Utopian thought. Apple should at least give us access to LOGS or troubleshooting tools. I had an issue when setting up a new HomePod, it wouldn’t connect to wifi when using an iPhone to set it up… I had to remove the WiFi network from my iPhone, reconnect the iPhone and try again. It worked but who would’ve guessed ???. I’ll say it again: I hate the “it just works”
One thing that Apple should have focused on while building the technology for HomeKit is "How do people *debug* this thing?". When users do have problems, it can be very painful to track them down. A few examples: 1) I setup two smarthome cameras to use Apple Secure Video. It took a little work and there was some confusion on my part, but eventually I had them working fine. And then two weeks later the "secure video" part wasn't working at all. I contacted Apple Support multiple times. All people seemed to want to help, but (as you say) some of them were not very good at the "We'll get back to you" step. Others were very excellent at *trying* to help. Eventual solution: Log out of my AppleID on my iPhone (thus losing everything iCloud-ish on it), and then re-authenticating and setting up everything wrt iCloud on the iPhone. Figuring out this problem took over a week. 2) I replaced a 1st-gen AppleTV-4K with the current most-modern model with Ethernet. I did this partially to have an AppleTV with Matter support. Most of my smarthome devices worked fine, except for the three devices I had which had support for Matter but not support for AppleHome. Eventual solution: (a) remove devices from AppleHome, (b) reset the devices, (c) in some cases, remove batteries from the devices, (d) finally add them back into Apple Home. Figuring out this problem took me *hours,* for just three devices. 3) I installed new firmware on two Aqara G3 smart camera/hub devices. Watching the video from these cameras went from perfectly fine to basically unusable. One of the cameras is in the "far side" of my basement, and I could walk from the stairs to the camera, turn around, and make it almost all the way back before any image of me would show up on the video. I contacted Aqara support, who were nice but had no idea what the problem would be. In replying to their reply to my trouble ticket, the following point occurred to me. Since the time I had installed the firmware update, the only way I had tried to view the camera video feeds was via the Home app my iPad. It seemed like I should try from somewhere else, so I tried from my iPhone. The video on both cameras worked almost perfectly. Not quite *perfect* (the way it had been before the firmware upgrade), but much much *much* better. Eventual solution: Power-cycling the iPad. Note that my Apple Home setup is switched over to the "new architecture" for Apple Home, so it is certain that my iPad was not being used as a hub. Figuring out this problem took me at least a few days. The other frustrating aspect of this is how much detail is involved when contacting Apple or Aqara support. I do *not* mean that _"They ask a lot of stupid questions which annoy me",_ I mean that there are just so many details which *might* be important. In the second reply I was working on for Aqara, I had written at least 150 lines of "possibly relevant" details before it occurred to me that I should check the video streams from my iPhone. And of course after I had power-cycled the iPad, I deleted all those lines of detail and just wrote _"I rebooted my iPad, and now it's working at 99% of 'perfect'."._ All that time that I spent writing details that no one else would ever read!
On the "secure video" problem, I should add the detail *_(ugh!)_* that the part that failed was that I wanted recording to happen only when "Everyone has left home". Which meant to test it I had to make some change in my setup, and then get into my car and drive about a mile away from my house to see if it noticed that "Everyone has left home". It wouldn't, so I'd drive back, make another change, and then get back in my car and drive a mile away. Very tedious, but I couldn't think of any other way to test it. And from that you can see why the state of the iPhone might have been important. It was the location of my iPhone which determined when iCloud would register that "Everyone has left home".
Another aspect of the difficulty in debugging is that once you *do* figure out a solution to some weird problem, you don't feel like taking the time to write up all the details of the problem and the solution so that someone else can read it.
Since the 16.5 upgrade, my HomeKit stopped working. I called eero, called Apple, and no one could figure it out. I too had to rebuild my home and it took me a long time, so I am so happy that you posted this video because I thought I was the only one that had to do it. Apple needs to do better.
I have experienced exactly this in the last 48 hours. Ended up in the same place, total homekit reset and rebuild. I only have 20 or so devices, but the pain is real. Thanks for taking the time to get it in front of Apple engineering and applying a little pressure with this video. In a twisted way, I’m actually kind of glad you and others are having the same problem. Would have sucked to learn there was one setting I missed and I nuked the whole system for nothing. Now we can hope Apple will give some ability to prioritize home hubs and exclude devices that want to be a hub, but can’t.
Yikes. The wife and I jUst moved from apartment to townhome. Stuck with Spectrum as our ISP, but in the apartment, internet was provided and of course couldn’t be taken with. Once internet was installed at the townhome, I learned it was fiber, so the MoCa adapters I got were not needed ‘cause the coax ports were useless.
When it came to reinstalling everything, my 3rd Gen. ATV 4K connected to the WiFi and my new home with no problems, but everything else I had to reset (HomePod minis, couple smart plugs, few Nanoleaf A19’s). So far, so good. Have also added Ecobee Lite’s that came with the home and most recently an Aqara U100, and everything is going great. Thankfully I never had to go past the ol’ ‘Reset’ step!
I had the dreaded no response to all devices happen once. This was about a year and half ago. Had to rebuild my smart home from the ground up. Recently with the new architecture update, my wife wasn’t able to view anything. After three hours and fifteen minutes on the phone with Apple, I saw a post on Reddit where someone linked a profile which would allow the user to nuke their HomeKit data. I ended up doing that on her phone and then I reignited her and it worked fine. Apple support still has a ticket pending follow up with me on how to resolve it. I agree with you that Apple support can be very frustrating at times.
Same issues here. Eventually one day things started adding for no apparent reason. They need to put “Matter” back in the oven it still has a lot of baking left. My Nanoleaf bulbs are dumb now they never work reliably and eventually go non responsive. I’ve learned to avoid all matter and it sucks because Nanoleaf was my favorite. Kudos to Belkin for not jumping onto Matter like the rest.
I’ve never been a WeMo fan but maybe they were actually onto something there… I have no doubt things will get better, I just hope it’s soon. I’ve been having some reliability issues with my Matter Nanoleaf bulbs as well.
I have the exact same issue when the ‘Connected’ hub is not a thread border router, then thread devices tend to lose their connection. After power cycling the Connected hub, another device becomes the Connected hub and that generally fixes the problem for a while, even though the new connected hub may not have thread. All my hubs are Apple devices. Very disappointing that Apple has not addressed this after so many months. At a minimum, they could prioritize their thread border routers to be the ‘Connected’ hubs so that older non-thread hubs are avoided.
Hi. Reaching out from the Cayman Islands!!! I had the issue of several of my devices not responding. It was soo frustrating. I had issues adding the new matter nano leaf bulbs as well. A lot of my devices are now responding. I was able to eventually add the nano leaf bulbs as well; however, they are not very responsive. Thank you for sharing this vid. I know that I am not alone.
Because there's so many parts of the system that can create these issues, its very much a Gordian knot to untangle some times! I have to commend you on your calm conveyance of your frustration and commitment to solving the problem even though it was ultimately a very painful fix/workaround.
6:04 I have that same stand for my HomePod. Love it.
Thanks A LOT for taking the time to explain and document all of this in your video. I was halfway in the process (but with MEROSS support not apple) with no better success. It saved me valuable time to watch and learn from your tests, they were so close to mine :-) I ended up doing exatly what you did and .... VOILà it solved everything. Thanks again.
I’ve had my Apple Home give me the no response on many or all devices more often lately. I’m hoping not to have to go and delete it all but it’s good to know all the steps you took. Thanks for posting your experience.
I’ve had to nuke and re-create my smart home before, so I feel your pain. 150+ smart home items, dozens and dozens of automations and scenes… it’s painful!
So painful!
Thanks for documenting your experience on this. I'm sure it will be handy for people going through the same issues.
I have been experiencing stability and performance issues since the last update, and possibly from the update prior to that one. Something that I had noticed in the past was that the Apple TV being used as a hub would cause sluggish response. In the past I solved this by configuring the Apple TV’s not to act as hubs and all was good as the HomePods took the load very well. I just noticed you can no longer remove Apple TV’s from the hubs!!! Apple added them all back in and I am convinced that a lot of my issues come from this move.
HomeKit really needs a proper maintenance tool.
Brad, I’m both most sorry (said in the best Canadian accent I can muster) that you had to go through this and yet happy it was you given your penchant for turning lemons into lemon aid. You’ve got a great set of tips here. When I first started my Apple Home, I could not get any of my devices to take on what Apple refers to as a personal request (accessing app data on your iPhone or iPad, such as calendar, phone calls, or even texting). I use Siri all the time so this drove me nuts. I also eventually worked with Apple customer support and had someone take ownership of the case. This is what people should ask for once they reach their third person. I have forgotten his name by now, but even just the psychological relief from him saying that he’s taking ownership and will be with me until this is resolved was a big relief. It ended up being a security feature I had turned on after watching one of those UA-cam videos on”…10 settings you must turn off now on your iPhone!”
Like many of us, I also became massively frustrated with my Apple Home randomly and often nonsensically changing my home hub. After reading various ideas, I manually selected my hub by unplugging all 22 home hubs, waiting for 20 minutes, and then reconnecting the power on my desired hub. Viola! Even after turning the rest back on, it stuck with the first home hub. That’s when I went fully crazy. I bought 20 Eve SmartPlugs and connected every home hub to a SmartPlug. I then programmed a series of scenes to power down all of the hubs in the middle of the night. With so many hubs, I learned that you cannot get away with one scene and the final scenes make a north to south column in my house: first row is the west side with all hubs in that north/south column, then the middle row of west to east, and finally all hubs on the east. I leave on my desired hub that is an Apple TV 4K located almost perfectly central in my home and is connected via Ethernet. All hubs are then brought back up 20 minutes after the last row of hubs is taken down. The result? It works like a charm. I have had this same hub as the only hub I ever see flagged as my connected hub for over 2 months. It can take some time, and WAY too many Eve SmartPlugs, but you can wrest control back from Apple!
Thanks Dr. Cole! I’m glad I learned from this process and hope it helps others in some small way. Wow, That’s some serious dedication to selecting your home hub! Take that Apple!
As always, Appreciate your support!!
That’s insane. But I totally understand it. My home is small. I have a robust three Eero Pro 6 and an Eero Pro 5 wifi network. The Internet originates from one end of the house through wifi to the other EP6s. My newest Apple TV 4K is connected via Ethernet to an EP6 and is in the center of the house. But for some reason, Apple keeps electing the Apple TV HD, the oldest device which is the furthest from the Internet origin, connected only via WiFi, as the Home Hub. I’m convinced it’s why the HomeKit Secure video has such issues. I wish Apple would allow ME to elect which devices may be Home Hubs. They seem to be bad at it.
That’s insane. But I totally understand it. My home is small. I have a robust three Eero Pro 6 and an Eero Pro 5 wifi network. The Internet originates from one end of the house through wifi to the other EP6s. My newest Apple TV 4K is connected via Ethernet to an EP6 and is in the center of the house. But for some reason, Apple keeps electing the Apple TV HD, the oldest device which is the furthest from the Internet origin, connected only via WiFi, as the Home Hub. I’m convinced it’s why the HomeKit Secure video has such issues. I wish Apple would allow ME to elect which devices may be Home Hubs. They seem to be bad at it.
Matter connectivity standard is going to be on IPv6 standard. Right now, most ISPs do support IPv6. But you may want to contact them and ensure your modem is IPv6. The. Your router would also have to have the ability to switch to IPv6. Once this is figured out, all your devices that connect via WiFi would have to be reconnected to your network under the IPv6 connectivity standard.
Great tip, thanks for sharing!
I’m having almost the same exact issue currently. Only difference is I can add matter devices but the all it says is “No Response” did all the same steps and test as you and on a test home it works. Now i’m just procrastinating, deleting my primary home and creating a new one. It’s sad and sucks to have to do it. Done it 3 times throughout the lifespan of Apple HomeKit. It’s just been awhile and I have double the amount of accessories that I did the last time I did it. Wish me luck! Haha
I’ve had my Home reset to a previous version 3 or 4 times, deleting any new accessory added after a certain date. One weird thing was that an old iPad that was not a “Resident” account could still see and control all the accessories. Likely also corrupted memory after talking to support. HomePass codes were also deleted for any new device so that was useless. Same with the Controller app “backup”. The solution was to call Apple as soon as it happens again so they can get some logs. AKA no solution, though it hasn’t happened in a while so maybe it was fixed in an update.
What I did to make things a little easier next time was to take a photo of all HK codes and label them in my notes app in case I have to rebuild my home again. Folders with the individual rooms made it organized for me.
Very well done video. I've had numerous problems with Home over the years, but not like you. I have over 175 devices in one home so my worst Home Nightmare is rebuilding an Apple Home......
I “upgraded” my eve energy to matter and it completely bricked the device. It will not pair to Homekit no matter how many times I’ve tried. Eve owes me money for my broken product and my wasted time.
I appreciate you sharing this story. This sort of thing drives me bonkers. I recently bought my first HomePod-- the mini. It worked perfectly for a few days, but then out of the blue it no longer responds to my Siri shortcuts. Your situation sounded far worse.
Yes, I set up an automation that’s triggered by an NFC tag near my back door that runs a script that will lock or unlock the door according to its state and announce that it’s doing so. It worked great until it suddenly stopped working. Then three hours later, the door kept cycling the lock as all the failed requests went through. VERY VERY weird, annoying, and insecure since what if the last state left the door unlocked and I wasn’t home? You’d think these requests would be time stamped and expire. But apparently not.
Brad, you most certainly earn the award for persistence! Thank you for posting this video. I had no success with two matter products that I eventually returned.
I did all of the things you did save involve Apple.
One fix I attempted but was unsuccessful is to ENTIRELY delete that app I loaded onto my iPhone, in order to reload, start entirely over. The app was persistent in iCloud. How do I entirely delete an app so that it no longer exists anywhere in Apple's iCloud or anywhere else? Thanks to all who may try to help me with this.
I know your pain! Because of that I move to Home Assistant and added Homekit acessories to Home assistant and now i'm very satisfied. Works like a charm in 99% of time and have the possibility of doing more complex automations.
Btw, I have the same problem than you with Hub 2. The problem is apple leading with matter. Hub 2 works good in home assistant
Wow Brad. That is a lot of effort. Thank you for sharing. I’ll step very slowly into matter.
I have the same issue. Unfortunately, I also tried to add a new home with a different router and a HomePod 2nd gen as a border router but had no luck. I have tried with Eve Energy Switch, Nanoleaf A19 bulbs, SwitchBot Hub 2 and WIZ Hero lamp and same result. I don’t know for now what else to try…. Thanks for your video.
Wouldn't it be nice if Apple would keep backups of the Home, and let you restore to them. So that if the home setting .plist or whatever got corrupted, you could just say "this is broken, let's try a previous version that worked pretty well" so you don't have to build the whole thing again. I have a lot of automations that are running continuously (creating a watch-dog timer that watches for devices going non-resonsive, and internet connectivity issues to reboot my modem) and rebuilding all of that from scratch would be rough.
Yes! That would be great. Let's hope we see that option soon!
I don't feel so bad with my smarthome problems, and I'm not even using Matter or Thread. The technology is just not ready for PrimeTime. I could NOT pair a $300 EVE outdoor floodlight cam. It said the pairing code was incorrect, but the sticker on the manual and the light said differently. I never got it to work and EVE was useless.
I’ve had my home corrupt twice, the first time, like you I worked with Apple and got no answer and ended up with a semi functional home for a while until they ran out of road and I took the plunge, second time i began to notice some serious weirdness, did the same as you and set up another experiment home, worked properly, so I just blew the whole thing away and started again, fortunately it’s not happened for a while and I’m not going anywhere near matter until I have to.
The lack of advanced configuration features in homekit is a curse as well as a blessing as when it just works it’s great, but equally when something begins to misbehave, or when you could do with forcing something and you can’t it’s a real problem.
Such a great point on the lack of configuration features.... Great in some ways, but frustrating in others, especially when there is a problem. Matter will get better we just need to be patient.
I unfortunately had to Nuke my apple home a few months ago and I agree that the process, while absolutely frustrating, ended up making my entire smart home so much better after recreating it with all the experience I’ve gained over the years.
I hear you, things can get pretty cluttered over the years. I would love to see Apple create a backup and restore option right in HomeKit. Thanks for watching!
I have to give Switchbot credit where it's due, their products aren't rock solid but if they can't resolve the issue they are very prompt to issue a replacement. Had the same experience with my curtains when it was bricked by an update.
I’m not looking forward to the next version of iOS and what it might break in Apple Home.
Most users won't experience this more than once, but it may be worth sharing. If you're moving, even if it's a local move and your home is going to be set up in the same exact configuration (room names, zones, etc.), be prepared to rebuild your entire Apple Home when you do, including factory resetting all of your Apple home devices. In my experience, once you create a home in Apple Home/HomeKit, it's geo-locked with no way to change it, and you can't even reuse an old home name. Unlike Brad's situation, you'll also have to do this for some 1st party devices that use hubs, which also requires resetting all linked/child devices. Also, have a new email address for those 1st party apps that force you to create a new account when you move. I'll spare the long troubleshooting process for brevity and your time, but I will say it was a similar level as Brad's.
Thanks for sharing. Makes me never want to move!
Had a similar issue a year ago, same results from Apple. They had no idea what’s the issue was other than a corrupt file somewhere in the HomeKit settings.
I Apples defenses I don’t think they can much. Think about how many users they have, how many different variables there are for everyone’s home set up. There can’t be a way to have that many experts to cover that many variants. But every time I have had something relative simple to fix they have been SO on it!
Agree Steve, it''s hard to blame Apple Support. It's just the reality of the situation. I would love to see an option within HomeKit to backup and restore, this could be helpful for these types of situations. Thanks for watching!
I had a nightmare when I updated to new HomeKit architecture. It didn’t fully fix until 16.4 or .5. I can feel your pain. I have over 140 different devices. Building a new home would be catastrophic. I have separated HomePod OG to a new home or thread and matter devices are unreliable. I wish Apple put more priority in HomeKit software to make improvements. This is low priority for them.
I feel your pain. I expect this will get better, just hope it's soon!
Thanks for the lesson and the bug report to Apple
I had this same issue. Updated to new architecture in 2022 when it was first available and everything went unresponsive. I had the same frustrating issues with apple support and it took over six months of back and forth with them before the decided it was a corrupt database issue on their servers and had to rebuild from scratch. The hours I spent with them deleting unrelated apps and trying different WiFi systems was really terrible. After my full home rebuild which they said was the only fix, I now have the “ghost home hub” bug where a nonexistent home hub shows as not responding permanently. Very frustrating.
I so feel your pain! Though luckily I've never experience the “ghost home hub". That sounds crazy! Let's hope a future update fixes that.
Sometimes I love doing a full reset because it then gets rid of unused or duplicate scenes and automations. It could be good if you don't have many but I get your frustration of having a large amount!
I have been VERY frustrated with matter. I got the more expensive Apple TV 4K to get that ethernet port and get a home hub. I then got Nanoleaf matter bulbs and other devices. I'm not going to go through all the details. Sooooo many issues. And I run my own business. I do not have time for this. I want to pay $$$ for good tech and then I just want it to work! Honestly, I'm not even sure what to do. Nanoleaf has terrible customer care. I'll try some of the solutions you have mentioned.... when I have time....
It's still very early and Matter and Apple have a long way to go. The original Nanoleaf essentials are currently much more reliable than the Matter version. Not Nanoleafs fault (I don't believe), it's an issue with Matter, and how it's managed in Apple Home. it will get better, but it's hard to just wait when you've already spent the money on these devices.
@@TheBradLloyd Thank you for the reply. I was waiting months to get the Nanoleafs with Matter and, I'll be honest, I had high expectations. Hopefully the issues will be resolved.
Hey Brad, thanks for the great video showing that they can be issues with Apple Home. I have a similar issue but with just Philips Hue. This weekend I plan to erase everything Hue and start again. This will suck as I have 21 hue lights and accessories. Wish me luck!
Great discussion. Thanks, Brad, for sharing. I've concluded that the experience we have here is the norm and is not going to radically improve any time soon. The reason is the technology is constantly changing. Thus, the price of investing in home automation is we need to be competent troubleshooters. Don't install more complexity than you can troubleshoot. I know, that's easier said than done but it's a warning that just because we can have a home automation capability does not mean we should add it.
A key part of system maintenance is documentation of our installation. I like to think I'm pretty good in this regard, but I'm learning I need to rethink my documentation system. It has evolved over the years and is too fractured and incomplete. If anyone has a template for documenting home automation installations, I'm interested.
I went through an exercise recently concerning if we sell the house, how should we handle the home automation capabilities? After a lot of discussion and scenario modelling, I concluded all home automation functionality needs to be removed. Devices like light switches that can default function to a manual mode can stay, but all hubs will be removed, Wired and WiFi network removed, and the smart functions that any remaining devices are capable of are disabled. If the new owner wants home automation, he will have to build it from scratch. I would prefer to not take this approach because I believe home automation adds real value to the home. Unfortunately, the value added if more than offset by the downside of leaving it in place.
I don’t plan to sell my home, but if I did, I’d probably discuss it with the new buyers. We use Lutron lighting, so all that could stay and they can either use it as is or they could reset up the hub and do their own thing. The beauty of Lutron Caseta is that anyone who encounters it can figure out basic functionality very quickly. Home automation customizations are too personal I think. I’d leave things like window and door sensors and smart locks in place. I opted for Level Home Bolt locks so they work just like normal locks. I’d probably replace the thermostat with a cheap non-smart version, or the one that was there before I replaced it, if I could find it.
Apple support: “I don’t use Apple Home, but I have one of those ALEXA things!” 😂
Right?! They barely know what HomeKit is, let alone Matter. 😏
another instance of why I'm avoiding matter in my Apple Smart Home at this point. thanks for the video!
I can understand that. 6 months ago my comments were people complaining about products that didn't support matter. 😂 It will get better eventually!
Yup, deleted my home in the myQ app because the bridge was a pain, it deleted my HomeKit home as well, had to rebuild from scratch. Apple tech was worthless I ended up explaining to the adviser and teaching him, he didn’t even know what Matter was.
Very similar situation to Brad’s. I have also noticed adding any product lately is more tedious that it was in the past…
Yikes! That is a weird one.... I've actually had issues adding myQ back since rebuilding. I'm thinking of switching to Meross.
I find that adding new HomeKit devices seems to take longer than before as well. Fine with me though, as long as it works!
same experience its crazy how much time we spent on trying to fix shit from these billion and trillion $ company's. I switched from Google Home to Apple Home its just the same shit and unreliable. I cant hear it anymore, to restart or reset from any support. I am at the point where I am just waiting that shit is fixing itself and hopefully SW updates make it work in the future, frankly it only can get better.
So what you do if the issues starting again? you completely redo everything again? come on, that cant be the solution.
Quick question Apple TV should i buy the old model which is cheaper or buy the new one is there much different
Stuff like this is what will keep home automation in a niche. The big problem is the utter lack of transparency of what is happening (or not happening). The lack of user accessible logging makes tracking down problems nearly impossible. Instead of finding out where it’s failing you have to do shit like in this video. We need to demand better from the tech industry. The whole “It just works!” ethos of their deign falls flat when it doesn’t work. Instead of having clues you can use to figure out how to fix it, you get an ever-growing list of busy work to do. And a LOT of that busy work is arduous as it requires totally redoing things, not because that will actually fix it, but because it MIGHT fix it. Who knows, until you try? That’s truly terrible design and the average consumer will not tolerate this.
The best thing with Matter, Echo and Google Nest Displays are great Thread Hubs that still work for Apple Home.
When you decided to wipe your Home, did you use the HomeKit reset file? It’s essentially a file that completely wipes your HomeKit home. Resets your data in your keychain, removes all homes, and anything that might not be visible but is contributing to the inconsistencies. I’ve had a HomeKit since it’s release, so I imagine any issues I have is related to this old stale data we cant even see.
I did not, I just deleted it. It generally seemed to fix the problem though, so I guess it worked. Good tip on the reset file, though hopefully I never have to worry about that!
What is the name of the iPad wall bracket you are using? Looks cool :)
I don't see if available right now, but here is the link. It works well. geni.us/AB4jUe
Hi Brad great video I have a consistent problem with all my home hubs (9) disconnecting and reconnecting and thus I cannot control my home externally I am going to try and disconnect my two older Apple TV’s and see if this helps - tks
If this is any help to others my nearly 9 month issue with Home app connectivity was resolved immediately by disconnecting the two apple tv’s in my home. Apple support have been no help in all this time. Tks Brad
Thanks for sharing. I'm having trouble too with ATV as primary home hub. It shouldn't be this way, but good for people to know.
I still have some problem with some matter devices were Apple's home app will claim that it cannot contact the devices, and yet the very same Apple device (my iPad) will instantly report any notifications which come from that device. Eric Welander just posted a video where he notes that some devices which support Matter _(and do not have direct support for Apple Home)_ really prefer to speak over iPv6 instead of IPv4. Thus people might experience problems if their home network is setup to be mostly IPv4 without much thought to IPv6. That describes my home network, so my guess is that I should take the time to setup all my network devices to be as IPv6-ish as possible. I'm not looking forward to that!
I’m having this issue with a new smartwing blind that replaced an old one that was making noise. I can’t seem to be able to add it to HomeKit 🤦🏽♂️ I have two more and those are working just fine
That’s odd… Make sure to factory reset first by pressing and holding for 6 seconds. Should jog up/down 3 times in total I believe. If you are still having trouble, then reach out to Smartwings. Perhaps they sent the wrong HomeKit code….?
Thank you The Brad Lloyd. These are GREAT TIPS! I have been having similar troubles with Home App and my accessories, and similar responses or non responses from Apple agents. I even had the same questions, is it my wi-fi? (I added another mesh router and it seems things got worse.) Is it an OS update? Is it a Home Hub? Is it my wi-fi provider? Have I exceeded the max number of accessories for my mesh system? My patience is shorter and is waning. Might be an age thing, lol. THE STRUGGLE CONTINUES! New question, should this be a struggle?
Sounds like you have quite the situation... It's hard to know the root cause of your problem. Usually your router will say how many devices it supports, so good to check for that. Another question would be if the issue is HomeKit in general, or just wifi issues? Backing up and re building may be the answer. I hate suggesting it, but at a certain point it's the only option, and the fresh start can be nice.
Unable to add accessory is the most frustrating error with the exception of "Cancelling..."
My Apple TV doesn't have Thread or Matter. Do Nanoleaf and Apple still support Homekit over Bluetooth ?
What a frustrating situation, but it looks like you came out the other end all the wiser! This video is an amazing guide for troubleshooting any Apple Home issue and I'll definitely be referring back to it. Thanks!
Thanks Dustin!!
I had a critical homekit bug introduced by a factory reset of my Apple TV 4K and it broke the entire thing. Everything stopped working, showing not accessible. I tried literally everything and had the exact same experience as you, just different issue. This was after they “fixed” the new architecture. So basically homekit is great everything, but apple has a complete garbage software here full of bugs, their team thinks it’s acceptable to just default to “have you tried resetting everything and resetting it up for an entire day of your life.” The lack of backup is crazy. Really an annoying aspect of apple and one of the worst product lines from them imo. Could be great eventually, but if I have to reset everything for a third time I’m gonna loose it.
have you had problem with connecting to many 2.4ghz devices? I have my device keep disconnecting ?
Good video as always as I’m having big matter problems. I just bought a 3 pack of Nanoleaf bulbs and after getting the first one in no problem but the second one wouldn’t go into my ecosystem as it says closed for security 😢
That's an error I haven't received.... Not even sure what to recommend on that one, but please share if you fix it.
@@TheBradLloyd I finally got it to scan but I get a can’t add accessory error
I hope everyone is aware matter heavily relies on ipv6… so I’d look into that too… if the ISP doesn’t support it, there is still link-local.
No problems with Matter since iOS17.2, before it was flaky. Using EVE, Aqara and Nuki Matter/Thread devices.
Great video… thanks!
What a painful spell you’ve had… thanks for making us aware of potential ’Matter’ related change-over issues… I can see the frustration in your face and the irritation in your voice.
I don’t have nearly as much smart stuff as you (some Nanoleaf bulbs and some Eve plugs) but even these go wonky once in a while. Luckily my problems usually resolve with a simple reset (to the light bulbs) or sometimes simply ignoring them and they eventually return to work properly again.
I have not switched to ‘Matter’ and do not intend to do so at this time. I have only Apple stuff and plan to continue that way. Also, I read that once you switch to Matter on your devices there is no going back.
I knew this was going to be Apple related. Ditched iCrap in early 2010s.
OMG! Total Dèja Vu! I could have done this exact video. Add the fact that I installed the latest beta to fix the issue but then Apple Support wouldn’t help me after that… so, uninstalled beta and went back… Great video and thanks for doing it… although it was “trauma triggering” and I was clenching my jaw the whole time.
Sorry you had to go through that as well… Beta updates can be tricky because sometimes it can have a fix to a known issue, but it’s also a “use at your own risk” thing, so then Apple won’t help. Hopefully this is the last major issue we have to go through….
How do you know which items are being used as a hub?
In terms of Apple Home, all devices would be controlled by your primary Hub at that particular time. Standby hubs can relay info to each other, but the "primary" is doing the work.
I'm currently found myself in a soup of HomeKit (meross), Hue, Govee, Smartthings, and freaking google nest, thanks to these companies spotty and changed promises on HomeKit support, so I'm looking forward to Matter, and trying to not buy ANYTHING until it's finalized, this make me so mad. it's such a pain in the ass. I wish I could start over and go 100% hue and HomeKit. I was this close to covering to Caseta, but it was a worthless journey without colored lighting, so I stayed with Hue and Meross (Meross because it's 1/15th the cost for RGBH bulbs)
It will get better, it has to. We knew there would be some growing pains..... For reliability Hue and Lutron are top notch. Meross isn't at that level but like you said, for the price it's good enough.
So far with the new betas on 17 the Apple TV seems to be taking the role as primary hub.
Have you since received an answer? The past two weeks my matter Meross smart plug, habitat c-8 hub, Aqara Motion Sensor P2, and Wiz wifi bulbs are nonresponsive. There are still many accessories that work including the lights in my home from Philips hue and Lutron with the hubs, my Logitec circleview doorbell works, my eve outdoor cameras, and Schlage lock, plus the HomeKit version of the Meross smart plugs. My husband's Android phone indicated IPv6, but my iPhone didn't show a router number for IPv6. I then went to the router and enabled IPv6, restarted the internet, unplugged and restarted all accessories and hubs, and restarted my phone. Still no response from those same devices, I then deleted an Aqara P2 motion sensor from HomeKit and tried to add it back via Matter. It can see the device but it's stuck on the connecting screen over and over. Any current suggestions to troubleshoot for any of those items? I'd hate to also have to rebuild my home.
The unfortunate TL;DR is :: smart home house of cards falls down so let's build another house of cards. My take is this type of hobby is TOO time intensive and effort for me, and I'm retired. I think I'll stick with my ultra simple smart home set up for now...
Not being able to pick primary hub is a pain. I think I would want ethernet connection to my primary. Was thinking about switching to apple for smart home, but may wait
My problem is not being able to designate the main Matter hub and some backups (in an order I choose is very annoying. I have two 4K Apple TVs and an HD Apple TV. And the HD, which doesn’t support Matter or Thread, always wants to jump to the head of the queue was screwing with my Thread and Matter devices. Plus my HomePod Mini pair always tries to wrest control from my Gen. 2 HomePod pair.
I can reboot something and it will pass the control to something else, but everything reboots eventually. So my AppleTV solution is to force the HD to not be eligible to be a hub at all, ever. I have six other devices, so that’s not a problem. But there’s no reason to not let us choose. At least those of us who know what we’re doing. Apple needs to seriously commit to this.
I'm with you.... If there is no way for us to choose then Apple needs to improve the reliability so it doesn't matter (no pun intended). In theory it should matter if your non-thread device is the primary, but I'm having this issue as well.
I’m not familiar with home assistant but could all of this have been way easier to handle if you had everything integrated via home assistant as your main controller for apple home? Matter is just plagued with bogus implementations from each manufacturer even though its a “standard”. My nanoleaf essentials A19s are horrible, they keep losing all the settings as far as colors or temperature, no adaptive lighting with matter and circadian lighting implementation from nanoleaf is garbage and just keeps resetting to default scenes.
Great video Brad. I'm so sorry you spent hundreds of hours on this - hopefully Apple now realises it needs to invest more into HomeKiit. Do you think it's best to connect all hubs & bridges on the 2.4Ghz frequency? And can you access these if your phone is on the 5Ghz frequency?
LOL, I tried Matter, and I added it to Google Home, but it was always offline. LOL! Try and Android phone to configure the device.
I’ve noticed that when I restart my routers if fixes the connection to all my HomeKit not responding devices
What a pain the a…. ! I feel you bro . This happen to me as well , I had to erase my home and started adding all of my devices from my home. Took me a few hours as well since I have so many smart things 😵💫 support was no help , I can even tech them about Home and settings 😂
I am having the same problem I can’t add no accessories to homehit
I am surprised by two things in this video:
1) that you didn’t have a test Home already for testing new HomeKit/Matter products
2) that you created the test home that late in the troubleshooting game
No hate or anything, just not what I expected I guess. I have steered very clear of Matter products for this very reason long before the release of your video.
I’ve bought a thread Eve Motion. I still can’t connect. Same error message.
Oh boy.... It's the Matter version? Do you have other Matter products? Hope you can resolve it without having re-create your home.
Wow seamless cross platform technology we have come so far NOT. Still can't figure out how to charge my devices with usb c and 40 power protocols.
Wasn't Eve the only brand that screwed up their firmware so that devices couldn't be commissioned with Matter using an Iphone? I guess their firmware upgrade to Matter did give them Android compatibility. #Matterishere I've had great success with every matter device out of the box. Some bad firmware with Eve and early Hue versions. Now Eve and Hue's firmware works great and all my matter devices work smoothly out of the box. The great thing now Philips Hue works and bridges any Zigbee brand to Apple Home and other Matter platforms. No need to buy $50 Hue bulbs.
I had to nuke my home and start over again when I changed my WiFi and used a different SSID and password. I tried to just change it in the manufacturer's app. Some devices would let me and some would not. I ended up getting so frustrated that I nuked it all and started over from scratch. It made a world of difference.
One thing that saved me a lot of grief is all of my light switches were Lutron Caseta (42 total). Once I added the hub back to the new home, all of the lights reappeared in the correct rooms. My Aqara hubs (6 Camera hubs, 3 security hubs, 49 child devices) added back all of the child devices but put them into the room that the hub was in. I had luckily named all of my devices unique names and was able to figure out where to put them back at. My WiFi devices had to all be factory reset and added back one at a time. I have 49 client devices using WiFi and Ethernet. I also have a large Thread network (21 Eve devices, 2 Nanoleaf bulbs).
So not nearly as many devices as you but it was still quite painful. I can empathize with you on what you had to go through to do this.
It took me a full two days to get all of my devices added back. I then had to go through all of my shortcuts and fix them as they were missing the devices I was using in IF statements. The scene names were all still there so that is another reason to use scenes in automations and not use individual devices. I had a spreadsheet with everything documented, including each rooms scenes and Personal and Home automations, as well as Shortcuts. After about a week, I had everything working again.
The only outstanding issue I have is that I cannot read my Honeywell T-6 Lyric thermostat. I was able to add it to my Lutron app and can set the temperature there. I cannot set it in the Honeywell app which is a piece of trash. I am planning on replacing it with an ecoBee thermostat in the near future.
My automations were unstable on HomeKit, moved them all to Alexa, haven’t looked back
I had the failed to add with an eve motion sensor and ended up needing to restart my phone to get it to add.
Thanks for sharing, glad the restart worked!
I feel your pain Brad when it comes to contacting apple support regarding Apple home. You literally have to educate the reps on how Apple home works. Very frustrating. I’ll never forget the rep saying, “wow you are an apple home power user. I can finally tell someone that it’s possible.” SMH. Glad everything is up and back running.
This is why I ditched apple in early 2010s
No idea what happened with my Apple Home. One day when I asked Siri to turn on a light, she responded with something like, "You need to have Smart Home devices installed first!"
I couldn't remove items from my smart Home first, so some things would behave really weirdly because they thought they were installed in 2 houses. Eventually I had to reset everything back to its factory setting.
I don't have a lot of smart home devices, but it still took me AGES! We used to ask Siri to control lights all the time, now we control most things on the home app. The reason being Siri often asks, "Who is speaking?" We removed Siri from the Home app and our iPhones etc and completely started afresh, including toggling Siri's access to iCloud off, then back on again. Meh!…it has never been the same since before the reset.
My Eve Door and Window contact sensors sometimes don't seem to work since migrating them to work with Matter.
😢
Sounds pretty brutal..... Siri is..... ok, but needs a lot of work. I find the larger the smart home the worse Siri gets because it's hard to clearly differentiate between various device names and scenes. I haven't had many issues with the "recognize my voice" feature, but you could aways turn it off. It's helpful for personal requests like different family members sensing messages or adding to reminders etc.
I haven't upgraded my Eve Door and Window to Matter yet, but I will. Matter still isn't solid, but I expect it will only get better.
iPad's no longer can work as a hub
Correct. Not once you upgrade to the new home architecture.
What’s the Matter?
Apple supports team have no clue about HomeKit
holy apple fan boy
Oh totally. Can't argue there, I'm all in (for better or for worse)!
I hate the “it just works” philosophy from Apple. They still like to believe that Utopian thought.
Apple should at least give us access to LOGS or troubleshooting tools.
I had an issue when setting up a new HomePod, it wouldn’t connect to wifi when using an iPhone to set it up…
I had to remove the WiFi network from my iPhone, reconnect the iPhone and try again. It worked but who would’ve guessed ???. I’ll say it again: I hate the “it just works”
OMG! 😢😅ML!
One thing that Apple should have focused on while building the technology for HomeKit is "How do people *debug* this thing?". When users do have problems, it can be very painful to track them down. A few examples:
1) I setup two smarthome cameras to use Apple Secure Video. It took a little work and there was some confusion on my part, but eventually I had them working fine. And then two weeks later the "secure video" part wasn't working at all. I contacted Apple Support multiple times. All people seemed to want to help, but (as you say) some of them were not very good at the "We'll get back to you" step. Others were very excellent at *trying* to help. Eventual solution: Log out of my AppleID on my iPhone (thus losing everything iCloud-ish on it), and then re-authenticating and setting up everything wrt iCloud on the iPhone. Figuring out this problem took over a week.
2) I replaced a 1st-gen AppleTV-4K with the current most-modern model with Ethernet. I did this partially to have an AppleTV with Matter support. Most of my smarthome devices worked fine, except for the three devices I had which had support for Matter but not support for AppleHome. Eventual solution: (a) remove devices from AppleHome, (b) reset the devices, (c) in some cases, remove batteries from the devices, (d) finally add them back into Apple Home. Figuring out this problem took me *hours,* for just three devices.
3) I installed new firmware on two Aqara G3 smart camera/hub devices. Watching the video from these cameras went from perfectly fine to basically unusable. One of the cameras is in the "far side" of my basement, and I could walk from the stairs to the camera, turn around, and make it almost all the way back before any image of me would show up on the video. I contacted Aqara support, who were nice but had no idea what the problem would be. In replying to their reply to my trouble ticket, the following point occurred to me. Since the time I had installed the firmware update, the only way I had tried to view the camera video feeds was via the Home app my iPad. It seemed like I should try from somewhere else, so I tried from my iPhone. The video on both cameras worked almost perfectly. Not quite *perfect* (the way it had been before the firmware upgrade), but much much *much* better. Eventual solution: Power-cycling the iPad. Note that my Apple Home setup is switched over to the "new architecture" for Apple Home, so it is certain that my iPad was not being used as a hub. Figuring out this problem took me at least a few days.
The other frustrating aspect of this is how much detail is involved when contacting Apple or Aqara support. I do *not* mean that _"They ask a lot of stupid questions which annoy me",_ I mean that there are just so many details which *might* be important. In the second reply I was working on for Aqara, I had written at least 150 lines of "possibly relevant" details before it occurred to me that I should check the video streams from my iPhone. And of course after I had power-cycled the iPad, I deleted all those lines of detail and just wrote _"I rebooted my iPad, and now it's working at 99% of 'perfect'."._ All that time that I spent writing details that no one else would ever read!
On the "secure video" problem, I should add the detail *_(ugh!)_* that the part that failed was that I wanted recording to happen only when "Everyone has left home". Which meant to test it I had to make some change in my setup, and then get into my car and drive about a mile away from my house to see if it noticed that "Everyone has left home". It wouldn't, so I'd drive back, make another change, and then get back in my car and drive a mile away. Very tedious, but I couldn't think of any other way to test it.
And from that you can see why the state of the iPhone might have been important. It was the location of my iPhone which determined when iCloud would register that "Everyone has left home".
Another aspect of the difficulty in debugging is that once you *do* figure out a solution to some weird problem, you don't feel like taking the time to write up all the details of the problem and the solution so that someone else can read it.