Connect to Siri

But there are no Alexa phones out there.
It’s only Apple’s phones and Google’s Androids phones.
Pretty stupid idea to leave out the top major market share for compatibility when it comes to the main feature people want to use.
Sure maybe you can install a second voice assistant on a given device or phone but having two of those certainly would drain battery life more and decrease performance and also get quite confusing for those that aren’t very tech-savvy. Also the native voice assistants are far more powerful since they have direct access to the phone’s operating system and hardware.

Then on second thought it could also be the fact that Apple is extremely picky and locked down when it comes to their ecosystem. Then maybe wyze can’t pony up and pay the mighty Apple in order to be authorized and connected to their ecosystem.

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In order to control any Wyze products with Siri on Apple devices or in the HomeKit app, HomeKit support is needed. This is not currently an option, but it is on the Wishlist

HomeKit is gaining popularity, but it wasn’t as popular as Amazon and Google when Wyze started integration with these services. I’m not entirely sure, but there may be some issues between Apple and Wyze in trying to get this going too. This is the most recent update on this:

Also some interesting information regarding requirements from Apple:

In the end, make sure to look at the product’s specs for the compatibility of third party services before purchasing.

What is HomeKit? Is that just Apples version of the Google Home app?
Sorry, like i said, I am not a Apple user and don’t know much about their ecosystem.

I see the app on her phone, but it did not find any of the Wyze products, but it found her bluetooth speaker.

Yes, it’s more or less Apple’s smart home platform.

Wyze products aren’t compatible with HomeKit as previously mentioned so they won’t be found by HomeKit.

Quick update on HomeKit.

I’m revising my position on the integration. With the current state of the SmartHome, I will oppose any direct integration with HomeKit. But before calling for my head on a spike, hear me out! :slight_smile:

If you are following the smarthome tech news, you have probably heard about CHiP (Connected Home over IP) or as it is known now: Matter. If not, head to: https://buildwithmatter.com to get a quick intro.
The second thing is that Wyze has joined the alliance. See our name at the bottom when you expand the list of participants.

My recommendation around HomeKit has moved from we should do it to not do a direct integration anymore, Wyze should make Matter compliant devices. Why? Because by making the devices Matter compliant, we would be making it HomeKit compliant AND also Alexa and Google Home but also … SmartThings and many more ecosystems that are going to be Matter compliant.

So where does that leave us. Well we have a joined the alliance about a month ago and we are currently evaluating the effort that it would take to get the devices compliant (ie: we are trying to digest the 1,500 pages of specs). This is not an overnight thing unfortunately and the expectation is that Matter compliant devices (in general, not Wyze specific) will show up early 2022. Once we have a better grasp on the spec, we will start looking at the devices that could be good candidates for Matter and work with the ODM to see if they can do that integration.

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Shouldn’t that all been thought out before they made the current smart home products?
Again Apple is pretty much the major market share when it comes to smartphones and users.
All that you just said makes no difference to the average person that just wants things to work with what they have and refuse to change based off of one company’s lack of compatibility.

Personally I only ever use Android, so never realized that none of the Wyze products support the same functionality on Apple platform. But I have been trying to help out others get things set up for them, mostly a very tech illiterate or elderly people. They all use apple iPhones. I also am starting to use iOS devices for work related purposes and it’s a bit annoying to have two separate devices to control different aspects of my smart home endeavors.

Hello,

I’m wondering if there is not a little confusion.

We have taken in consideration the iOS crowd, which I’m one of. You can download the Wyze application from the Apple Store and enjoy the same experience that you are experiencing on Android.
While most of the experience is using the common denominator between the two platforms, we have room for improvement to make each app leveraging more of the platform specificity (ie. Siri Shortcuts and other form of widgets…).

HomeKit refers to the ability to use the Apple Home application on iOS. This app provide an Apple experience and ecosystem for all home connected devices (plug, bulbs, sensors …).

While Apple benefits from a major position in the Smart Phone market, their position in the SmartHome is … negligeable. Alexa and Google Home are what makes about 90% (not the exact number but order of magnitude) of the smartHome ecosystems. The remaining 10% is very fragmented and counts also Wink and SmartThings from Samsung but account also for systems like Savant, Control 4, Home Assistant and so on.

Overall, the decision to not start on HomeKit was due to the more complex requirements that Apple is putting on a device that is HomeKit compliant and the complexity of the certification. It is also a very different technical architecture for the integration relying mostly on local control vs Alexa and Google Home that are requiring Cloud integration for the control. In other words, we can more easily develop and flex the implementation in the Cloud where HomeKit requires firmware changes in the devices making things way more complicated.

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I think your confused. Most people use iPhones, period. When you can do voice control on all other platforms, save one, then that is the issue.
Most people who use IPhone will probably get homepod and think they can use the Siri voice control to turn off their smart plugs and bulbs etc.
But, not if they are Wyze. You are saying they need to invest in any of the other “smart assistant” ecosystems in order to do that. So someone may have then Siri and Alexa…etc. that is confusing, but does make thing work…but not ideal.

I am just saying, no voice control via Siri on wyze products is a deal breaker for many I have learned.
The people I was helping, upset, but partially my faut for recommending the cheaper Wyze products to them , not knowing they can not do voice control with Siri. I still love wyze products for the most part, but should I ever move over to the Apple ecosystem…they will have to be replaced.

Thank you for the information and comments.

I don’t think I’m confused but I agree with your point for the most part.

The only thing that is missing is the fact that Apple does not offer Siri voice control for any app. The areas that Siri can help with and control are very limited and do not cover anything SmartHome related today that I’m aware. So it’s not that Wyze did not do the work, it’s that the work today is not possible, again that I’m aware.

This should change once they roll out the support of Matter, which loops back to my “initial” post.

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Thank you WyzeFrederik for these updates! That’s so AWESOME! I personally don’t care about Apple at all, but I was linked to your comments here by a friend because what you said is so applicable to TONS of things people are hoping for! These comments by you make me want to celebrate. I saw a bunch of articles and announcements about CHiP switching to “Matter” with a huge IOT Alliance, and I was hoping this would mean that Wyze would be able to easily integrate with everything now, and your comments here just confirmed that you guys are doing just that! That is HUGE! I don’t think people realize the enormous implications you basically just announced you are working on.

I have been wondering Why we hadn’t heard anything about API’s since the AMA last fall, and it now sounds to me like you’re instead going to put your effort into “Matter” and that will actually provide access to the majority of things everyone else wants anyway. Matter will allow everything to work with Apple, Google, Alexa, Home Assistant, SmartThings, Hubitat, all the other things everyone’s been asking for, so it would be insane to waste your time and limited memory space working on each platform individually when simply being Matter compliant will instantly allow access to ALL OF THEM as soon as they are also compliant with the standard.

Man, that is so awesome. Apple Users should be rejoicing that within a year or so they should be getting most of what they’ve wanted…as will all the rest of us. Granted you can’t control the readiness timelines of every other platform, and I’m sure it will be a lot of work to make all your devices compliant, but since it is all open-source, a lot of it should be fairly collaborative and easy to copy a lot of the most important general code.

Man, I am bookmarking your comments here because they are the answer to many other things. It sucks to hear it might be another year or more before the standard is totally ready for everything, but at least we now have some hope. I was considering looking for alternatives to Wyze to be Home Assistant compatible, but if Wyze is going to be Matter compliant, then I no longer have to worry about that…just waiting the year or so it takes for everything to get done.

I’m sure may not be able to say concretely yet, but will you be making most of the past devices Matter compliant too, or mostly focus on the newer ones? I assume it partially depends how much it all adds to the firmware, and whether each device has enough memory to be able to support compliance or not.

Anyway, I just wanted to thank you profusely for this news. This is exactly why I come to these forums for when people like you share such great news. Many of us understand the implications and present you have just offered here and we’re very grateful for it! Thanks man. I wish I could get an alert or email everytime you comment anywhere in any thread. Almost everything you say is a goldmine of interesting info.

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I concur 100%. Awesome information and already making the rounds as I have seen this referenced in other threads.

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Sorry I want to be very precise. We have joined the alliance and therefore are seeing the benefit BUT we have not committed to make a device compatible YET. There are a lot of milestones that we have to go through before we can fully commit to it and announce a product.

Now, if you allow me to speak under my name and not as a Wyze employee, I truly believe that Matter is going to happen and will not be just another protocol. I believe that Wyze will have no choice but to adopt it due to market pressure.
My work right now is to make sure that we have a clean and clear path to get there so that we can continue to maintain the price component, retain the agility and enable all the goodness of Matter.
There are a literal TON of changes that are required to get there from the hardware to the cloud and the app and this needs to be seriously planned and staffed. We have already a full schedule to 2021 as you have seen with the launches so far so it’s going to be a very tight balancing act to influence and impact the schedule to sprinkle some Matter magic into the products. Not impossible but Wyze will have to be very opportunistic and agile to get there.
Side note: one event coming to get more details about Matter is: Project CHIP is Matter: Now What? - Silicon Labs .

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Yes they do…at least in some fashion. I have a smart ir blaster I got off Amazon. Broadlink. It has connect to Siri option in their app. I can create a shortcut voice command to turn on or off any item I have programmed in in their app. It lacks other controls like change temp or channel etc, but for most devices I have, I just want to turn on or off via voice, it works fine to say Hey Siri, turn on/off xyz. It does not support homekit btw.

So far, it does seem overall, Apple is much more limited in the smart home venue compared to competitors. To this I was not aware until I started to use iOS a bit.

Siri was best in class for a very long time and they fell behind the competition, Alexa and then Google Home took over completely. For the home, they never really played into it but finally realized that they needed to be there.
The fact that HomePod mini is prices soooo low (for an apple product) is a clear sign that they want back in that game. The second big tell was the inclusion of Thread in the HomePod mini! That was a clear shot in the home automation direction. It has been confirmed again by the inclusion of Thread in the new Apple TV and seeing their level of participation in Matter.

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Poor Bixby, he hasn’t even made it into this convo :rofl: :joy: :rofl: :joy:

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Poor Bixby? Cortana has basically been executed and purged from all memory…

But Wyze AI is a new growing toddler and already more useful than Cortana ever was…

Siri has some catching up to do to get back up to Google/Alexa standards.

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A first party HomeKit integration would be swell.

In the meantime, I just found out that it’s possible to get Wyze devices into the Apple Home ecosystem via Home Assistant. It’s a free, open source, customizable app that runs locally on a computer or IoT device.

I got HA set up on a Raspberry Pi and installed the HomeKit and Wyze integrations and now I can control my Wyze bulbs, locks, and cameras through Siri and the Home app. Pretty sweet.

I have deleted my Wyze Plugs and gotten Weemo ones instead.
Smaller physical design, and work native with HomeKit and Google and Alexa.
Since it seem clear that Wyze has no real plans for HomeKit support in the near future.
I plan to give to a friend my old Wyze plugs.
Still have 2x v3 Wyze cams in use in my family, which is now all iphone users, as i can not find any cams alike to them that have the same good quality picture and features for the price

For those those that still want to keep their WYZE products and use HomeKit, you can try out this server software that may be useful.

My homebridge solutions quit working a month or so ago. Seems the plug-in for homebridge isn’t working anymore. Is it working for you?

When i looked at the pages for that HomeBridge, it listed multiple Wyze Plugins, of varying ages.
Maybe try a different one?
I did not bother with that HomeBridge software, as didn’t want to spend the time to mess with it, and also assumed it would not be the most reliable if the plugins are not kept updated.