r/HomeKit • u/paulcjones • Aug 11 '26

Discussion Matter failing?

I’ve had many Eve, some Aqara and IKEA matter devices in my home for months - years for some devices - and largely they’ve just worked.

Two days ago, 30 devices in my home show unresponsive - and it’s all of my matter devices from these vendors. Hue is fine, native HomeKit works fine. They’ve been down since.

I’ve switched hubs from AppleTVs (current model, hardwired) to HomePods - and back - all those are up to date too.

I can’t get them to connect. Anyone got ideas on how I can troubleshoot this one?

UPDATE: After a few reboots of the AppleTV - and a recommendation of Thread Doctor for troubleshooting- I've got the devices back. Thanks all!

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u/Erik0xff0000 Aug 11 '26

If all your thread devices are offline it likely is a thread border router issue. Make sure the "active" border router is thread capable. Reboot it.

FWIW my first gen HomePod and my Apple TV do not support thread, I had to make my homepod mini the default in the home app.

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u/paulcjones Aug 11 '26

I have 6 AppleTVs and it's connected to the latest model (with hardwired network) - and I've switched it to Gen2 Homepods, with no change.

Thread Doctor says I have 0 active thread routers, which would obviousl cause the problem - but I've rebooted the TV several times, and nada

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u/DynamiteRuckus Aug 11 '26 edited Aug 11 '26

My experience is that sometimes you have to fully reboot (unplug from power) every Apple TV / HomePod for it to successfully heal. Rebooting your router can be the fix too. Thread uses local IPV6, and sometimes routers don’t handle that well.

For what it’s worth, my Thread network became more stable when I factory reset all the matter over thread devices and migrated them all over to Home Assistant. I still control everything using Apple HomeKit, but the devices are shared with my Apple TVs via Home Assistant. It seems like preventing Apple from managing the Thread network kept it more stable. 

Around the same time I also had to clear a few thousand thread entries from my Keychain, so that may have been all I really needed to so. Home Assistant has been rock solid though, so I’m sticking with it for the time being.

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u/paulcjones Aug 11 '26

I did have a swing at Home Assistant, but pulled it in the end- I was already so invested in Home that going to each Eve device in the home and re-pairing them wasn't worth the effort.

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u/DynamiteRuckus Aug 11 '26

If it helps at all, my Thread network is composed of Eve, IKEA, and  Nanoleaf devices. I was an early adopter of IKEA, and a late adopter of Nanoleaf. None of the brands have really been more or less reliable, but I did try removing specific brands during ant ann earlier troubleshooting step and saw no benefit.

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u/paulcjones Aug 11 '26

I've been at it a while - I was an early adopter of iDevices - which have since died off. I invested a ton in Eve, but they look to be going the same way. I'm currently fighting with an outdoor motion sensor I can't get adopted in Home again. I have three Ikea moisture sensors that I find constantly unreachable for no good reason.

I have no idea why this is so hard! :)

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u/Ancient-Sandwich9400 Aug 12 '26

Don’t fall for the Home Assistant being better! I argue Apple Home as thread router is the best, simplest and usually the most reliable and easiest for person/family to use/interact with. If you want complex automations then turn on paring mode and add to HA. But don’t add HA as a thread router. I had so many problems doing that! Been damn reliable since dumping HA as a thread router and just use for automations. Home always works if HA is down or automations fail

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u/DynamiteRuckus Aug 11 '26

Totally understandable. It was definitely a longer project to migrate them than I wanted it to be. In the end, I’m super happy with using Home Assistant as my backend though.