SmartThings First to Add Matter 1.5 Camera Support
Samsung Electronics has announced that its smart home platform, SmartThings, now supports Matter 1.5, enabling compatibility with Matter supported cameras.
Later this month, Samsung will begin rolling out SmartThings updates that expand the existing range of supported Matter devices, which already includes lights, door locks, switches, and sensors, to now cover cameras. This update extends Matter support within the SmartThings ecosystem to an additional device category.
Samsung has stated that its objective is to provide a consistent user experience across products and services from different brands and protocols through SmartThings. The company added that it will continue to support industry standards such as Matter and strengthen collaboration with partners to deliver new user experiences.
The introduction of camera support is a significant development, as cameras are a core component of many smart home systems. Matter 1.5 supports a range of camera types, including indoor and outdoor security cameras and video doorbells. Supported functions include live video streaming, two way communication, motion detection, event history, and perhaps most excitingly, PTZ – pan, tilt, and zoom controls.
With SmartThings supporting the Matter camera standard, manufacturers can develop Matter based cameras that integrate with SmartThings without the need for separate, platform specific APIs. Samsung has worked with several IoT device makers, including Aqara, Eve, and Ulticam, on the development of Matter compatible cameras, with products expected to become available from March 2026. Xthings has already announced its first Matter compatible camera, the Ulticam IQ V2.
SmartThings already supports camera products from brands such as Aqara, Arlo, Hue, and Ring using a variety of protocols and connection methods. The addition of Matter camera support provides users with further options and simplifies integration within the SmartThings platform.
The big question for HomeKit users, of course, is how will this potentially compete, replace or integrate with Apple Home’s own camera feature set, namely HomeKit Secure Video (HSV). Whilst not perfect, nearly all Apple Home cameras support HSV now, which offers a very unified set of functions within Apple Home. What’s missing is control for PTZ cameras, so if Apple plans to integrate controls for these types of cameras in iOS 27, Matter compatibility may not make much of an impact. Only time will tell.
