HomeKit broken after iOS18 update

I've had a very reliable setup for several years, noticed many issues around the time updated iOS 18.

1) ATV via Ethernet has always been the best standard for a reliable thread network on HomeKit. 18 released the ability to prefer a hub, but prior to this I had my HomePods on smart switches power cycling nightly to insure they were ALWAYS on and ethernet Apple TV's. the Apple TV has a much more powerful CPU, and that seems to be required with larger or more complex setups. I suspect when people unplug the Ethernet (or plug it in) it is simply loosing the hub and causing it to rebuild the thread network from scratch which resolves any issues.

2) I've noticed that the iOS version and updates are very temperamental after updating to 18. If ANY device is outdated (iPhone, mac, Apple TV, iPad, HomePod etc..) then I've noticed constant issues. Another thing I've seen is that the hub will prefer (if on auto select hub) the latest updated hub over any other hub. This also explains why people are getting a new phone, Mac, Apple TV etc... and it "fixes" it, I'm guessing it simply received the latest update. I don't know why they can't have different versions, but this has fixed it for me 3 times now, then rebuild the thread network and I'm back until the next update.

2 things I to try that should recover the your thread network.

1) update all your devices

2) In home app > home settings > home hubs & bridges, change the hub to different hub (or power cycle the current hub) to trigger a rebuild of the thread network. Give it 10 min, but can be up to a full hr to complete. For anything not responding after 1hr, you power cycle that specific device(s) they should all add back in fine.

PS, for those with Nanoleaf products. I've done extensive research. They are complete crap now, my old thread only bulbs still work great but any of the new "matter" devices are awful and can even mess up OTHER devices on my your thread network. A few tips for Nanoleaf stuff...

• You can use them in the Nanoleaf app (without matter integration) OR you can add in home app and not complete the setup in Nanoleaf app. But if you try to let both home app AND Nanoleaf app have full control of the bulbs at the same time, they will wreck your network. So either choose limited features home app, or choose Nanoleaf and loose the ability to use voice commands/automations app control.
• If you can't adopt, you may need to hard reset them. Turn them on/off 5 times for bulbs, hold power for light strips etc.. should blink several times red and reset. If you see device is already there, the ID is 3 characters and likely matches an existing IS, turning off the other bulb or device with the same ID while setting it up will work, but note those devices will likely get lose and mixed up.

This exact thing happened to me. And after 30min with Apple Support chat and eventually phone support, they weren't able to suggest anything beyond what can be found on: If your HomeKit or Matter accessory isn't responding in the Home app - Apple Support (CA)

But the information provided by Bjm070 fixed it. I also found that I my Homekit Home Hub (see in Home Settings in the Home App) was set to my Apple TV. In the AppleTV's settings, I went in and removed it from the "Home". Then in the Home Settings in the Home App, I assigned one of my Homepod Minis to act as the Hub. This immediately fixed everything.

Hope this helps someone else too.

I had the same issue. Finally tracked it down to the fact that my Apple TV (acting as the HomeKit hub) has a direct ethernet connection. Unplugging the ethernet cable and switching to wifi fixed the issue and HomeKit was back up. I did several cycles (wired and wireless) to confirm that the issue/fix was reproducible.

Don’t know if this helps you but I talked to Apple support. The problem was that iOS 18 designated my Apple TV as the home hub. It wasn’t compatible with that version 1 of Apple TV 4K for that set of accessories. My HomePod was too old too and I had to make an Apple mini pod the home hub. Might help to check if your current devices are compatible with Ios18 to use as a hub for your homekit accessories. Apple support can tell you. .

For anyone still having problems with HomeKit constantly updating. iOS 18.1 is now available and after updating all my HomeKit problems with constantly saying updating is now fixed

Hope this helps someone

For any future user coming here in search of a more recent answer.

I got this exact issue today while hooking up my brand new Apple TV.

After upgrading my home per the suggestion in the home app, nothing worked. It detected none of my gateways as online, and I couldn't control a single device.

Fixed it after upgrading my Apple TV to the latest 18.2 firmware. That solved the issue.

I have been having the same issues since updating to the latest IOS updates. In the Home app, try changing which home hub you are using to connect your devices. I switched it from "Automatic" (which was my HomePod) to a specific home hub (Apple TV 4K) and all my devices that were non responsive became responsive immediately. I'll see what it looks like tomorrow but they all immediately started working so I'm hoping that was the fix I needed. Good luck everyone!

The latest Home app allows you to select the primary device to be used as the hub. Change the setting from Automatic to your selected device. I guess Apple added this ability after numerous complaints, including this thread. Based on the above discussions is seems that older Homepods should now be avoided when choosing a hub.

Incidentally, buried in discussions from years ago, I gave a tip to unplug ethernet from the Apple TV while setting up Homekit or adding devices (assuming the ATV is the hub). After that you can plug ethernet back in.

The other tip is to temporarily disable the5GHz band on the wifi router as older Homepods and some Homekit devices only work with the 2.4GHz band and modern "smart" routers can confuse them.

WOAH 🤯

Bjm070 wrote:

Don’t know if this helps you but I talked to Apple support. The problem was that iOS 18 designated my Apple TV as the home hub. It wasn’t compatible with that version 1 of Apple TV 4K for that set of accessories. My HomePod was too old too and I had to make an Apple mini pod the home hub. Might help to check if your current devices are compatible with Ios18 to use as a hub for your homekit accessories. Apple support can tell you. .

had spent an hour resetting devices and trying to get a garage door opener back online. Saw this, unplugged AppleTV Ethernet cable and BAM fixed. I hate that it’s the solution but I’m assuming this is an early ios18 issue?

This was a fascinating bit of information, Steven. I had the same problem, though only with one of my two iPhone 14s. One was showing the devices and allowing me to turn them on and off. The other was showing them as "not responding." I was pulling my hair out over this. After seeing your post, I tried unplugging the AppleTV from Ethernet and suddenly the Home app items were all responding on both iPhones. Is there any way to keep the AppleTV from being the hub? I have a 3Gb fiber connection but it must be hard wired to the router to provide any kind of solid speed, so having AppleTV connected directly with Ethernet allowed it to take advantage of all that extra speed. Using WiFi drops it down from 2700mbps to just 240 or so.

Something that I recently tried, and it worked.

If you can get into the settings of the router, and then find the mac address for the device or devices, remove them from the router, save and then perform the typical power off and on routine.

While being powered off, remove the device from the native app and the HomeKit app on your iOS device.

Then power cycle your iOS device you use. Power up the router, and when the iOS device is up, re-add the device or devices were not working. Technically, they should work now.

One other thing, once everything is completed, and functioning, consider going back into your router and turn every device into static device, using the same IP that the DHCP settings from the router assigned.

As I mentioned, I’ve done this, and everything now is functioning correctly.

I hope this provides both you and others, the solution for the Device/HomeKit iOS18 woes.

Your mileage may vary, so kindly let me know if my suggestion helped you, as I am curious.

Happy Holidays

edited for adding verbiage from incomplete sentences.

Try simple (but time expensive) solution, this helped me. All my Matter devices stopped working one day. I spent a lot of time replacing the router, rebooting hubs, debugging the local network, nothing helped. I assumed that this was not a problem with my equipment, but a problem on the Apple side with the HomeKit "database". I simply created a new Home with same Apple ID, and added all my devices to it without any problems. Now everything has been working for several weeks without problems. I have quite a lot of devices, and it took some time, but it helped me.