Aqara M200 Matter Controller and Zigbee Hub Drops
After unveiling a raft of new devices at CES and IFA earlier this year, Aqara has now quietly released its latest hub – the M200.
The M200 is another Zigbee hub from a company well known for its wide range of Zigbee-based devices, and it’ll look very familiar to many. It’s almost identical to the now slightly ageing M2 hub that arrived in 2020.
I say almost because the M200 now finally includes a USB-C port rather than the M2’s Micro USB port, and it also adds Power over Ethernet as an alternative power option. Aqara did release a PoE version of the M2, although it was only sold in China. The M200 also supports both 2.4 and 5.0GHz WiFi.
Beyond this small outward update, the M200 can not only function as a Matter Bridge, like nearly all of Aqara’s other hubs, but just as with the M3, it’s also a fully fledged Matter Controller. As a result, it contains a Thread Border Router and of course serves as a Zigbee 3.0 hub as well.
While the M200 lines up fairly closely with the M3, its lower price has been achieved by reducing device capacity to 40 Aqara Zigbee devices and 40 Thread devices, down from the 127 of each supported by the M3. Additionally, the M200 acts as a standard local hub, while the M3 can operate as an Edge hub.
Like its predecessor, it includes an IR blaster and a 90dB speaker, so it can control your AC and expose it to Apple Home just as the M3 can. Interestingly, Aqara claims the M200 can also detect when your existing AC remote is used, which keeps the AC state in Apple Home in sync regardless of whether you adjust it through your smart home or the original remote. AC control is only available when the M200 is added to Apple Home via Matter, though. This means you lose the option to have the alarm system exposed to Apple Home.
Another small but useful improvement over the M2 is the option to mount the hub on a ceiling or wall (also originally introduced in the Chinese M2 with PoE) . This is done with a 1/4-inch threaded bracket on the base. The M200 is also compatible with both Homey and Home Assistant, which has been part of Aqara’s plans for some time.
the Aqara Hub M200 is available now on the following regional Amazon stores;
- Amazon.com US$59.99
- Amazon.co.uk UK£59.99
- Amazon.de €59.99
- Amazon.fr €59.99
- Amazon.it €59.99
- Amazon.es €59.99
Would you know how the m200 is able to be sync with the aircon state even though the user used the traditional aircon remote to change the temperate on the aircon unit?
It’s probably unlikely, although Aqaras’s old P3 hub was capable of that. I can’t say for sure sure, as I don’t have the M200.