Ikea has taken a step towards standardizing home ecosystems by launching a new hub and app. After months of rumors circulating, the hub known as “Dirigera” is compatible with the Matter standard. Not only that, the Ikea Home Smart app is also finally official and should be available in the coming months.
TL;DR
- The new Dirigera hub integrates the new Matter connected home standard.
- The Ikea Home Smart app gives you better control over your connected home.
- The new Dirigera hub and app is not expected to be available until October 2022.
While the Tradfri gateway has been panned for its lack of usability, Ikea has launched a new Dirigera hub and revamped its Home Smart app. The new Dirigera, which is a “hub” and not a gateway like the Tradfri it replaces launched in 2014, Dirigera incorporates the new Matter connected home standard.
Dirigera: a new hub ready for the next generation of connected products
In terms of dimensions, the new Dirigera hub is just 2.7cm high and 11.2cm in diameter. This makes it almost half the height and slightly wider than the previous Trådfri gate, which was 4.5cm high and 11cm in diameter. There is an Ethernet port and a USB-C port for power.
The Dirigera hub has been dubbed “Matter-ready” by Ikea, as it has no official certification yet. For now, it remains unclear whether this new hub will be one of the first batch of devices to offer the new connected home standard or whether it will have to wait until next year. What is certain is this: once launched, the Dirigera hub and the new Ikea Home Smart app will be compatible with all existing Ikea-connected products and those from other Matter-compatible manufacturers.
Under the hood are radios for Wi-Fi, Zigbee and Thread. Shortly after launch, the Dirigera hub will receive an update to connect to your WiFi network via 2.4GHz/5GHz WiFi.
According to Rebecca Töreman, the Matter standard should enable the company to create a “more seamless experience” for customers and improve interoperability in the connected home and between connected products.
Ikea has not disclosed the list of products that are natively compatible with the Matter standard. Owners of the Trådfri gateway will not be able to use the new app when it is ready, and the gateway will not be updated to support Matter, which is a shame for the early adopters. This is always a risk that early adopters should embrace. However, the current gateway and Home Smart app will be supported for “at least three years” and receive security updates and patches, Rebecca Töreman said.
In addition, Trådfri owners will have to buy the Dirigera hub when it launches, but all Ikea Home smart devices must remain compatible. The final price of the Dirigera hub remains a mystery, but is expected to be more expensive than the Trådfri gateway, which currently costs $39.99. “The new Hub will be more expensive, because it will have more features and more functions,” says Töreman. But of course!
Promising new features for the Ikea Home Smart app
Ikea wants to make interactions with its new Dirigera hub more intuitive. The idea is to make it easier to group Ikea’s connected objects in its ecosystem and control them individually, in pairs or in groups using the new Ikea Home smart app.
It allows you to create different scenes with predefined functions of your connected objects and personalize your smart home even more. Hopefully the connected home will become easier to manage as time goes by rather than having to grapple with outdated standards and other thorny issues.
What do you think of the new Dirigera hub and the new Ikea Home smart app?
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