Matter bridges and hubs: what you keep and what you lose
A Matter bridge lets Zigbee, Z-Wave and proprietary devices appear in a Matter platform. What carries across, what may not, and what to check first.
By Noor Whitlock · · 4 min read · Comments
If you already own Zigbee, Z-Wave or other devices from a single maker, a Matter bridge is how they join a Matter platform without being replaced. The idea is simple. The trade-offs are less obvious. This guide is based on published specifications and documentation, read on 13 November 2026, and describes no testing: we do not test devices.
What a bridge is
The Alliance's FAQ says Matter has native support for bridges, so that devices on other protocols, such as Zigbee and Z-Wave, can take part in a Matter setup, and that bridges can be built into controllers and hubs. It says Matter and Zigbee devices cannot work together directly, so a bridge is the route and it is up to the maker whether to offer one. The standard's first release already listed bridges among its device types.
A bridge presents each device behind it to the Matter platform as a Matter device of its own. The platform talks Matter to the bridge, and the bridge speaks the older protocol to the device.
What you keep
- Your existing devices. Nothing needs replacing, and the Alliance describes bridging as a way to keep earlier investment.
- The maker's app. Home Assistant's page says a bridge lets you keep controlling devices in their native app while also having them in Home Assistant.
- Local communication, in some cases. The same page gives the example of a hub whose own Home Assistant integration uses a cloud service: bridging it through Matter lets Home Assistant talk to it locally instead.
- Smoother groups. Matter 1.3 lets a controller batch several commands into one message, and the Alliance says that with a bridge this can make a group of lights respond together, with less of the one-after-another "popcorn" effect.
What you may lose
- Features beyond the basics. Home Assistant's page uses the Philips Hue bridge as its example: it supports Matter, but Matter exposes a limited set of features, whereas the native Home Assistant integration offers much more and also runs locally. The page says you would gain nothing by bridging Hue through Matter and would lose features.
- Some of the devices. The page warns that you cannot count on every device behind a bridge appearing, and gives an example of a hub version that exposes curtains, locks and blinds but not lights.
- Control of new device types. A bridge can only expose what the platform supports. See which device types each platform supports.
- Independence from an account. Home Assistant's page says some vendors ask you to create an account before Matter can be switched on for some products, especially their own branded hubs and bridges.
What the platforms say about bridges
Apple's support page lists bridges among the Matter accessory types the Home app supports. We did not check Google's or Amazon's pages for bridge-specific rules, so confirm with the platform you use.
Home Assistant is a Matter controller and says on its own page that it is not a bridge: it cannot turn its devices into Matter devices for other platforms.
What to check before you buy or enable a bridge
- Does your hub or bridge offer Matter, and from which firmware version? Makers add it by update, and some do not.
- Which device types does it expose? Ask for the list, since a bridge can omit whole categories.
- Which features survive? Compare the maker's app with what Matter carries.
- Is there a native integration on your platform that does more than Matter? If so, weigh the two.
- Does the bridge need a vendor account, and is the Matter path local?
- Does your platform support bridges and the device types behind them?
- Is there a limit on how many devices the bridge or the platform will take? We publish no figure, so ask the maker.
UK context
Nothing in the standard is specific to the UK. If you already run Zigbee or Z-Wave devices behind a maker's hub, the first question is whether that hub has a Matter option. We have not checked which hubs sold in the UK offer one.
Our position
This is a comparison of what is published. A bridge that works well for one household can behave differently in another, and we do not claim any result from a bridge we have not examined.