Amazon announces support for Matter Casting at CES 2024

During CES 2024, a major event in the world of technology, Amazon announced that it will be the first company to support the "Matter Casting" feature within the Matter smart home standard. This initiative marks a turning point in the interoperability of smart home devices and services.

What is Matter Casting?

Matter Casting is a feature of the Matter standard, an initiative supported by tech giants such as Amazon, Apple, and Google. This standard aims to unify the control experience of smart home devices across multiple major platforms. Specifically, Matter Casting is an open local network protocol that allows streaming of video and audio without requiring specific hardware. This makes it easier to implement than proprietary alternatives and accessible to any app or hardware manufacturer.

Amazon's Implementation

Amazon has announced Matter Casting support on its Fire TV devices and Echo Show 15. This feature allows users to start watching a movie or browsing shows on their phone's Prime Video app and stream them to their compatible Fire TV or Echo Show 15 device. The company plans to extend this feature to other Fire TV devices and smart TVs equipped with Fire TV from Panasonic. Amazon is also working with other streaming platforms and apps, such as Plex, Pluto TV, Sling TV, Starz, and ZDF, to implement Matter Casting later in the year.

Impact on the Industry and Consumers

The support of Matter Casting by Amazon is significant for the smart home industry. Matter, as a standard, promises to solve compatibility issues between different devices and ecosystems. It is designed to allow Matter-certified devices to work together seamlessly, thus eliminating confusion and competing standards. The Matter technology works by enabling IP (Internet Protocol) networking between devices via Bluetooth Low Energy and Wi-Fi. This not only promotes the connection of physical smart home devices but also the communication between their applications and cloud services.

The adoption of Matter Casting by Amazon is an important step towards greater interoperability and a simplified user experience in the smart home ecosystem. As the first major player to implement this feature, Amazon paves the way for a broader adoption of Matter Casting, potentially transforming the way consumers interact with their smart home devices.