I recently bought a pair of Onvis Matter Smart Plugs (sponsored link), as my first foray into smart devices that use a Thread network rather than Wi-Fi. These were to replace my remaining Tuya smart plugs, which use Wi-Fi.
I’m going to review the Onvis smart plugs, and talk about why I’ve chosen Matter and Thread smart plugs over Wi-Fi or Zigbee.
Why not Tuya?
I bought my Tuya smart plugs several years ago, when I didn’t know so much about smart home technologies. At the time, we’d only recently got a Google Home Mini, and so I picked up a cheap smart plug which happened to support Google Assistant and IFTTT, as well as Alexa. The other advantage of Tuya devices was that they could work without buying a hub as a controller, unlike Zigbee-based devices from the likes of Philips and Ikea. Bearing in mind that the hubs often cost at least £40, it’s a lot for when you just want one plug.
I wouldn’t buy a new Tuya Wi-Fi device nowadays, for the following reasons:
- Wi-Fi devices use more power than others (Zigbee and Thread). Whilst we’re talking single digit numbers of watts here, having lots of Wi-Fi smart plugs around your home adds to your home’s ‘base load’ (sometimes known as a ‘phantom load’) of always on devices.
- Tuya devices rely on Tuya’s servers to work. I understand that users based in Europe use servers located in Europe, but it means that every request has to make a round trip to their servers. This makes it slower than a system where commands can be actioned locally. Now, millions of Tuya devices have been sold over the years and I doubt that those servers would ever go offline, but if they did, any Tuya devices would lose their smart abilities.
- Tuya is a Chinese company, so theoretically someone in the Chinese government could be logging every time you use a Tuya device. It’s a theoretical risk, but not having that data pinging across the internet in the first place is better for privacy.
The Tuya plugs that I have are also quite big, and not very sturdy.
Getting started with Thread
To use Thread devices, you need a Thread Border Router. Thankfully, I already have two, as they’re built into my Google Nest Wifi devices. You may also already have a Thread Border Router if you have some of the newer Google Nest Hub devices, a newer AppleTV or Apple HomePod, a newer Alexa device or a Samsung SmartThings Hub.
If you use Home Assistant, you can flash a Zigbee dongle to use Thread instead. Note that the blog post mentions enabling a ‘multi-protocol’ mode that allows you to use both Zigbee and Thread on the same dongle, but this isn’t recommended. As it is, my dongle just runs Zigbee nowadays but I may get a second dongle that I can flash Thread firmware onto. That way, Home Assistant has its own Thread Border Router, and it expands the Thread mesh network. Until then, Home Assistant is able to use the existing Thread mesh network that my Google Nest Wifi devices created – see How to join a preferred Thread network in Home Assistant for more.
Commissioning the Onvis smart plugs
When you get a new Matter device, it needs to be ‘commissioned’ to add it to your home network. You need to open the app for the smart home ecosystem you want to add it to (for example, Google Home, Apple Home or Home Assistant), select to add a new Matter device, and then scan a QR code on a label on the side of the device. In the case of these Onvis smart plugs, you also need to hold down the button for around 15 seconds to put them into commissioning mode. It helps to read the manual.
One of the reasons that I use smart plugs is that they’re controlling devices in awkward places, so I commissioned this in a place where I could sit comfortably with the devices plugged in, and then moved them to where they need to be. Otherwise, I’d be spending time crouched awkwardly in a corner.
Once commissioned, the Onvis plug will show up in the smart home app of your choice, and you’re done. I’ve been using them for a couple of days, and they seem to work well.
Why Matter and Thread?
So I’ve outlined why I wouldn’t use a Tuya device, but why have I chosen a device that uses Matter and Thread?
- Thread devices only work locally. Whilst voice assistants like OK Google and Alexa may still need to use the internet to interpret what you say, they don’t need to send the actual commands across the internet. As well as protecting your privacy, it’s also faster; these Onvis Thread plugs seem to respond almost instantly, rather than at least half a second with the Tuya plugs.
- The majority of Tuya devices do not work with Apple Home. This isn’t a massive problem for me, as although I use an iPhone and an iPad, I’m not a big Siri user. However, Matter devices are supported.
- The idle power usage of these plugs should be lower than Wi-Fi.
- As Thread is a mesh network, the more devices you add, the stronger the network becomes. It can also have multiple Thread Border Routers as exit points to your LAN/Wi-Fi network, so a network with several Thread devices and Border Routers should be very resilient.
- Many of Apple’s newer iPhones (iPhone 15 and later), iPads and MacBooks include Thread radios, offering even more resilience if they’re connected to your Thread mesh network when at home.
- I also think Matter is the future, although it’s taking longer than I would have anticipated for Matter devices to become mainstream.
These Onvis smart plugs are not the first Matter smart plugs that I’ve bought. Last year, I bought a pair of Meross Energy Monitoring smart plugs, although these use Matter over Wi-Fi rather than Matter over Thread.
Speaking of energy monitoring
It should be noted that these Onvis smart plugs do not support energy monitoring. They simply turn a socket on and off. Obviously, you can use automations in your choice of smart home ecosystems to set timers, or trigger them to turn on and off in relation to external events.
I’m noting this because it seems to be a common issue with these relatively early Matter devices – their Matter support is basic. With the Meross smart plugs for example, the Matter support is also limited to turning them on and off again. If you want to use their energy monitoring abilities, you have to use the Meross app, or install the Meross LAN integration from HACS for Home Assistant. These don’t use Matter and instead rely on Meross’ servers to send and receive data.
Price
I recently picked up a Zigbee smart plug for around £8 (including VAT) from AliExpress, which included energy monitoring. Seeing as these Onvis smart plugs don’t support energy monitoring, you may be surprised to find that they’re £25 each, or £40 for a pair (although as I write this, there are 15% off vouchers available on Amazon). So they are on the pricey side.
Which brings to the question about why I’m not just using Zigbee. After all, Zigbee is also a mesh network, and devices work locally. As it is, I have a small Zigbee network with the smart plug and a couple of colour-changing lights for our nine-year-old’s bedroom. And they work fine with Home Assistant. But then I have to use Home Assistant to make them appear in Google Home, and allow my Google Assistant devices to talk to them. Command fulfilment can be slow, taking a few seconds, and it’s unreliable – even when the Zigbee devices are obviously working, Google sometimes complains that they’re offline.
I suppose I could buy a Zigbee hub, like a Philips Hue or Ikea Dirigera, which would probably work better. But I already have Thread Border Router devices, and I’m hoping that Matter will mature as a standard.
Is £25 per Onvis plug worth it? Well, that’s up to you – but bear in mind that they work without needing a third-party app, will work with most smart home ecosystems, seem nice and sturdy and don’t rely on third-party internet servers. Hopefully, these Onvis smart plugs will be a good, long-term investment.
It’s also worth noting that these were the only Thread smart plugs that I could find on Amazon UK.
Matter Multi-Fabrics
One last thing to mention about Matter is its ‘multi-fabric’ feature, which allows you to add devices to multiple smart home ecosystems simultaneously. Initially, I’ve added all my Matter devices to Home Assistant, which has the Python Matter Server addon. On the device settings page, there’s a ‘Share Device’ button, which, when clicked, puts your device back into commissioning mode. You then get a new QR code in the Home Assistant interface, which you can use to add it to another smart home app like Google Home. You can then repeat the whole process for any other apps, like Apple Home.
This means that I have my Onvis smart plugs added to all three smart home apps, and they can be controlled by Home Assistant, Apple Home and Google Home. What’s particularly notable is that I was still able to control the lights in Apple Home whilst my Raspberry Pi running Home Assistant was restarting after an update.
Summary
Well, this ended up being a longer blog post that I’d expected. So, in summary:
- The Onvis smart plugs work well, are sturdy, respond quickly and are compatible with most smart home ecosystems
- They’re a bit pricey at £25 each, and don’t support energy monitoring
- You need a Thread Border Router device for them to work, but you may already have one
- They’re more energy efficient than Wi-Fi sockets, and don’t rely on third-party internet servers
As for what I’ll do with my old Tuya smart plugs? Well, I could convert them to run Tasmota I suppose.
