IKEA continues its push into the smart home category with a new line of Matter-compatible products, set to launch in January. The ready-to-assemble furniture conglomerate has been testing the waters with smart home products for a while now, but this is its largest release in the space yet.
Beyond stating consumers could expect 20 new products running the open source Matter standard, zero specifics were provided on which items will launch next year. “Bringing Matter to our products means we are taking a big step in the right direction, offering compatibility across brands, and lowering the threshold for people to get started,” said David Granath, range manager at IKEA.
In the meantime, IKEA is teasing two new Bluetooth speakers that will launch later this year. An affordable speaker designed to look like an old radio will launch in July under the name NATTBAD, and a table speaker named BLOMPRAKT with atmospheric lighting is coming in October.
Technical details are sparse, but the announcement describes support for features like multi-speaker setup and Spotify Tap. This would mark the first introduction of new speakers from IKEA since the company ended its partnership with Sonos earlier this summer.
IKEA says more updates about the new range of smart home products will come ahead of the January launch.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/home/smart-home/ikea-goes-all-in-on-matter-with-new-smart-home-products-144232740.html?src=rss