Can’t pair Matter accessories to Apple Home

Update since my last post:

as above I also had serious issues trying to pair Matter devices and after hours of reading and experimenting I found that you have to be on a 2.4ghz ONLY SSID / WiFi network. Every time I tried to add a matter device it would fail if the 5Ghz frequency option was enabled. This includes having the device (ie. iPhone ) also connected to that 2.4 ghz network. Most routers will automatically steer devices up to the 5Ghz band so if your router permits it create a new SSID that is 2.4 only and use that - even if you hide the SSID later. Hope this helps someone.

Adding more data to this thread - I had a Eve Motion (with a matter sticker on it) that was able to pair a month (maybe 2) ago that was working up until I deleted it to add it to another room (big mistake). I also have a brand new Eve Motion that out of the box will NOT pair with Apple Home. I've also had a Leviton in-wall Dimmer switch demonstrate this same behavior (it was upgraded from Homekit to Matter) and it will no longer pair. I've also exhaustively tried all of the various procedures below with no luck sans creating a new AppleID which I just don't have the patience of doing. My last try was to get another Matter Border controller (a Google hub mini with thread) to try to pair the Eve Motions - no luck there also. At this point I'm giving up and putting it up on eBay for sale.

Thanks so much for the suggestion jcirinci, it worked for me.

I spent an afternoon trying to add an Eve Energy Matter enabled outlet to HomeKit. The device paired (probably by Bluetooth) easily enough but then became not responsive immediately once added to Home.

I was on the point of giving up when I found your post, and now it works well, after I switched my Eero based network temporarily to 2.4Ghz only for set up.

Hi! Found this thread after having a very similar issue and I think I have found the solution (after nearly giving up).

For reference, the timeline of events is:

• Unrelated to HomeKit, I decided to change my Wifi network name and router (and then had to do so on my extender)
• Naively didn't realize it would disconnect all my HomeKit products which are all Matter products
• Thought maybe the HomePod was the problem so I reset my HomePod mini but then my phone wouldn't connect to it as a hub
• Plugged into my computer and reset it to factory, then was able to connect to it like it was new
• The next morning I was able to connect to 3 accessories effortlessly as my hub (or my phone) had a record of previously connected to Matter devices (this will be important later), but 3 would not connect (2 lightbulbs, 1 smart plug) and I was only receiving "failed to pair" not anything else that was helpful
• Had a theory and pulled out a smart plug I'd never connected to before and, as expected, it connected effortlessly
• Realized my phone was storing all of the devices I'd connected my hub to, so I went into my settings through home. You can see this by going into the Home app > Home settings > Connected Services > Apple Home > Manage in iOS settings and here you will find a handy list of any and all Matter devices you've ever connected to. The ones that are connected properly will say "My Home" or the title of your home underneath. The ones that are not connected don't have anything under them.
• I removed the devices I was having trouble connecting to from my keychain and services, and I was able to connect easily to them like they were brand new again! My problem was 100% solved.

Again, not sure if the original poster had tried this but wanted to volunteer this info as I manically searched for an answer like this here. Cheers!

I'm having the same problem. I have Leviton D26HD, D215P, and D26HD Matter devices and I am not able to add any of them. I spent hours on the phone with Apple and Leviton tech support with no solution. Apple wants me to try setting up the devices as another users but that's not possible if you don't have access to someone else's iPhone or Account. I'm going to have to creating another Apple ID account. Will try when I have some time this week. Hope Apple can find and fix this bug soon, it's very frustrating!

Thanks for the wlan hint, it solved my issue.

I contacted Apple again and they confirmed they are aware of the issue but don’t have a timescale for fixing it. They were unwilling to make any tweaks to my Apple ID to resolve it in the backend.

I’ve ended up setting up a completely new Apple ID which I only use for HomeKit. I can confirm that this works perfectly.

I have exactly the same problem., I can confirm it appears to be an issue with the Apple ID rather than anything to do with the device. I have the same issue using 2 different iPhones and an iPad - if I use may Apple ID I can't pair matter devices but if I use my wife's account it works perfectly.

Unfortunately I've had a support call out for several months and provided traces but to no avail. In fact for the past month they've stopped returning my messages on the support case.

I’ve gone further … When I use tools to view Matter devices on my network there is nothing there. I reckon this is all tied together. I have 2 AppleTV 4K’s that support Matter and 5 HomePod’s that all support it on the same network. I have verified that my ipV6 is all configured properly and yet there is not Matter protocol running on my LAN. In reading your post … All of the mentioned devices have been setup with my AppleID. My guess is that if I wipe everything out (not going to in the short term) and use a new AppleID to configure it all Matter will mysteriously show up.

With the first Eve Motion try changing the default (or previous) name to something else. I found this fixed an issue for me with LIFX lights that I needed to reset.

As others have raised in threads on this topic, some users are finding that routers are causing Homekit issues. My suspicion is that some are too smart for simple wifi devices and disabling the "smart" features might help.

This isn't going to help any ones case here but I have just called Apple support as I am also experiencing the same issue. Got through pretty quick to support however when I explained the issue she had no clue what Matter even was and asked if I could explain what matter was, not very good technical support, which is concerning.

I am assuming no one else has heard from Apple recently?

With so many devices now depending on wifi it is no wonder people are experiencing problems when they replace a wifi router.

My solution is, during installation of the new router, to change the SSID and password to the same as the old one. I have found that all my Homekit devices seamlessly connect to the new router.

It is actually irritating that router manufacturers don't provide this option as part of the set up of new routers. Also it should be much simpler to temporarily disable the 5Ghz band when pairing Homekit devices.