Smart Homes
Zigbee Vs Thread/Matter Vs Z-Wave: Who Will Win?
Foxy’s Lab weighs the smart-home protocol war, arguing Zigbee remains the safe everyday bet while Matter and Thread are promising but still maturing.
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Smart Homes
Connected devices, hubs and home automation.
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- Smart Homes
Schlage Sense Pro w/UWB, Matter, and Thread, Arrives June 29th
The Sense Pro is also Schlage’s first lock to offer hands-free unlocking using Apple HomeKey and Ultra Wideband (UWB) , allowing the lock to automatically unlock as users approach their door with a compatible iPhone or Apple Watch.
- Smart Homes
Cooling a Room Without Installing Air Conditioning
Paul Hibbert tests a no-install cooling option, the DREO TurboCool, as a smart-home-friendly alternative to fitted air conditioning.
- Smart Homes
Eufy Announces Three New Smart Locks with Matter Support
Eufy expands its FamiLock range with three Matter-compatible smart locks spanning facial recognition, palm-vein scanning and a conventional fingerprint model with Matter over Thread.
- Smart Homes
Is Your Smart Home Driving Your Family Crazy? Designing Automations Everyone Likes
Foxy’s Lab on building automations the whole household actually enjoys — covering busy partners, accessibility, neurodivergent users and kids.
- Smart Homes
Matter 1.5 Lands With Security Cameras, Closures and Energy Management
The smart-home standard’s biggest update yet finally adds security-camera support — meaning cameras that work across Apple Home, Alexa and Google Home — plus door/window closures and energy management.
- Smart Homes
2026.5: We’re on the same frequency now 📡
Home Assistant 2026.5 makes radio-frequency control a first-class feature, adds serial-port proxying over the network and expands its built-in maintenance and security dashboards.
- Smart Homes
Getting Started with Home Assistant on a Mini PC
A hands-on walkthrough for turning an x86 mini PC into a fully local Home Assistant smart home hub, from flashing the OS to building your first automations.
- Smart Homes
Well, This Looks Different
Foxy’s Lab launches a written blog as a companion to its YouTube channel, aimed at deeper dives, quick shares and tutorial content that works better as text.
- Smart Homes
IKEA’s New Matter Smart-Home Devices Hit Connectivity Snags — Fix Incoming
Early adopters report IKEA’s latest Matter devices dropping their connections, but the company says a firmware update is on the way.
- Smart Homes
Apple’s Long-Rumoured Smart-Home Hub Slips Further Down the Calendar
A new report pushes the expected launch window for Apple’s smart-home hub back again — a device seen as central to Apple competing with Amazon and Google in the connected home.
- Smart Homes
IKEA and Samsung Team Up to Simplify the Affordable Smart Home
A new collaboration brings around 25 of IKEA’s Matter-over-Thread devices — bulbs, plugs and more — into Samsung’s SmartThings ecosystem, aiming for cheaper, simpler setup.
- Smart Homes
IKEA acknowledges connectivity problems with budget Matter-over-Thread devices
IKEA has confirmed widespread pairing problems with its new low-cost Matter-over-Thread smart home devices after testers and customers struggled to connect them.
- Smart Homes
2026.2: Home, sweet overview
Home Assistant 2026.2 makes the new Home dashboard the default, renames add-ons to apps and launches a community-powered device database to help users pick compatible hardware.
- Smart Homes
Aqara Presence Multi-Sensor FP300 (review)
A review of Aqara’s wire-free FP300 multi-sensor, which packs motion, presence, temperature, humidity and light sensing with a choice of Matter over Thread or Zigbee.
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