Samsung's SmartThings Station Is A Minimal Way To Add Matter To Your Smart Home

The Samsung SmartThings Station is a Matter compatible phone hub and charger!

It's been a big week for Samsung. The company launched its latest range of smartphones, including the Galaxy S23 Ultra, which features a 200MP main camera. It was a reminder that Samsung first sold its ecosystem of devices with the announcement of the Windows-powered Galaxy Book 3 Pro range, which promised seamless integration with Samsung phones. Then with SmartThings, Samsung continues to remind us that it's still in the smart home.

The company presented the SmartThings terminal as a "gift" to the best participants. I took one home as I was in San Francisco for this event. Samsung announced the Matter-enabled smart hub at CES last month. It has a programmable button and wireless charging capabilities for your phone. It also received an update that brought the iPhone app in line with iOS 16.

You still need to purchase Matter-compatible accessories to pair with your SmartThings station. There are still a few options on the market, though more are coming this year. But I installed the SmartThings terminal to see what it looked like. At just $80, it's a pretty cheap way to build a smart home if you don't already have one, though I don't plan on replacing my existing setup anytime soon.

Setting up the Samsung SmartThings Station is easy

The SmartThings connection and wireless charging station has two indicator lights.

The SmartThings Station looks like any other charging station, but it has two status lights on the side: one for the hub itself and one for wireless charging. The station supports Matter, Thread, wifi and Bluetooth. It can connect to all kinds of smart devices, including light bulbs, outlets, thermostats, and televisions. It also serves as a Zigbee controller. If you want additional Z-Wave connectivity, you still need to purchase a separate SmartThings hub made by Aeotec. However, most of the popular connected devices such as Philips Hue smart lights use Zigbee, so it is a widely supported protocol.

SmartThings Station is not just a smart home hub. It also works with SmartThings Find to help locate any registered Samsung device (including Galaxy Buds and Galaxy Watch) or anything tagged with a Samsung SmartTag Bluetooth tracker. Wireless charging up to 15 watts. I believe if I plug it into a properly powered adapter it will charge just as advertised. I've had the most success with a 25 watt transformer. Anything less than 15W and the charge light will flash yellow.

You set up your SmartThings station in less than ten minutes. After closing it, I didn't have to ask the app to install it. When I opened SmartThings on my Pixel 7, I was immediately prompted to add it to the network. Now that you've clicked the Add button , you're done with the whole configuration.

Samsung thinks this is a device you can wear on your arm, so the SmartThings Station has a button. Three actions can be assigned to the buttons: press-and-hold and double-press, and each can be programmed to trigger a specific mode. I programmed it to turn the office lights on and off with every tap, and I like it as an alternative to talking to Google (not Bixby).

The setup process for SmartThings Station button programming is very simple.

Where is Samsung Home Hub located?

Over a year ago, Samsung announced that it would introduce the Home Hub, a tablet-like device for controlling SmartThings. A year passed and he did not come. The SmartThings Station is a potentially cheaper alternative to the cost of manufacturing and maintaining an 8-inch tablet. Google will release the Pixel tablet as a companion to its ecosystem this year, and it's doubtful Samsung will follow suit. But a quote from an interview with The Verge and Samsung's head Jaeyeon Jung indicates that the company will keep things simple in the smart home space:

We discontinued the SmartThings brand of devices and decided it would be better for consumers to include smart home functionality in our products rather than purchasing individual devices.

It should be noted that the SmartThings Station is one of the few Matter-enabled devices that syncs with an iPhone. Samsung updated its SmartThings app on iOS this week with support for the protocol, which means family members who use an iPhone can set up SmartThings actions (though they can't use it to locate an iPhone). While the SmartThings experience is different from the native integration offered by Apple Home, it's nice to see a cross-platform alternative for iPhone users. The Google Home app for iOS does not offer significant support for iPhone users.

SmartThings Station works with all Samsung and Android devices running Android 8 or later. Any issue running iOS 14 or later syncs with ZigBee, BLE, and iOS devices. It is also compatible with 2.4 and 5GHz Wi-Fi networks. Available in black and white for $80.