Matter underwent a sizeable stress test recently. At the Connectivity Standards Alliance’s (CSA) inaugural Unify event, Silicon Labs–a major industry contributor to Matter–revealed the results of a 200-node commercial office deployment using a Matter-over-Thread validation network. As per a statement from Silicon Labs, the deployment was designed to evaluate how Matter performs as networks expand beyond traditional residential use cases and into commercial and resimercial, with a particular emphasis on performance when exposed to active Wi‑Fi, Bluetooth and Thread traffic.
Inside the large-scale commercial Matter deployment project
Based on information provided by Silicon Labs, the deployment encompassed a large-scale office environment, with Matter-over-Thread supporting the setup and installation of 200 IoT devices encompassing lighting and building automation using Bluetooth Low Energy for device commissioning.
The validation network was built using the OpenThread Border Router (OTBR) implementation, which provided the Thread network infrastructure used to commission and manage devices participating in the test.
In the initial stages of the deployment, the network tested multicast messaging, unicast communications, commissioning workflows and long-term network stability under deployment-like conditions.
Silicon Labs’s findings
During the deployment, Silicon Labs reported reliable multicast and multi-hop unicast communications with mean multicast latencies as low as 87 ms and less than 1% packet loss across most payload sizes. Consistent, sustained operation was reported throughout the testing period, and Silicon Labs reported 100% commissioning success using on-network commissioning.
“Matter is rapidly evolving from a smart home technology into a platform capable of supporting much larger deployments,” said Daniel Cooley, Chief Technology Officer at Silicon Labs.
“This work demonstrates not only that Matter-over-Thread can theoretically scale to thousands of devices, but also how Silicon Labs is helping customers deploy, manage and future-proof those networks through innovations spanning Matter, Thread, and Concurrent Multiprotocol technologies.”
Why integrators should take note
Leveraging the new 1.6 version of Matter, the deployment serves as a stress test for many of the new features introduced to Matter over the years—many of which have been aimed at improving interoperability, communication and setup—with a particular emphasis on showcasing how Matter can perform at scale.
That last part is what makes this development worth following. While the luxury residential segment does tend to approach a commercial scale already based on the number of connected devices that need to be supported by the network, what CE Pro is more interested in is seeing if Matter might one day find a niche within resimercial environments like MDUs given how those spaces tend to favor retrofit-friendly solutions with fast commissioning and setup at scale.
More information on the Matter Large Network Performance report
The complete Matter Large Network Performance report is available at: https://www.silabs.com/wireless/matter/matter-over-thread-large-network-performance-testing.
