Following the massive 2026.4 update that introduced native PIN management for Matter smart locks, Home Assistant is officially rolling out the first beta release for 2026.5. This new version continues the steady push toward a unified, local smart home by adding support for new Matter device types, tweaking existing sensor integrations, and introducing a gorgeous redesigned control interface for robot vacuums.
A modern interface for vacuums
According to the official change log, the widely used more-info dialog in Home Assistant just received a major visual and functional overhaul specifically for Matter vacuums. The updated interface introduces lively, status-based animations. Your vacuum’s on-screen icon will now visibly spin when active, glide when returning to its base, rest quietly when docked, and shake to signal an error.
To improve overall navigation, the battery percentage indicator (my Switchbot doesn’t report battery level to Matter) is now prominently displayed at the top of the window, while essential controls like start, pause, and return are grouped into a clean, unified row.
Beyond the aesthetic improvements, the new beta finally makes the highly requested room-cleaning feature more accessible from the dashboard. While many modern smart vacuums support targeted area cleaning (Matter 1.4 required), Home Assistant previously lacked a native way to trigger this directly from the default popup. Now, you can link existing Home Assistant areas directly to your vacuum’s internal map, with selection available from the device popup.
This allows you to launch customized cleaning cycles for specific rooms right from the dialog box. If you have not set up a mapping schedule yet, a friendly built-in guide walks you through the process step by step. That marks a further step toward a vendor app–free Matter experience.
Expanded Matter device types and sensor settings
On the integration front, Home Assistant is bringing even more utility to the local Matter ecosystem. The 2026.5 beta adds official support for Matter-enabled radon sensors, which was introduced in Matter 1.2 but still rare on the market.
For climate control, the update introduces the Matter thermostat presets feature, alongside a helpful codebase fix that allows Matter thermostats reporting a null local temperature to function properly without throwing an error.
For home security and occupancy monitoring, the version added a dedicated child lock entity specifically for Eve Matter devices and introduced a customizable delay for transitioning from unoccupied to occupied states on Matter PIR motion sensors.
Additionally, the beta introduces a dynamic sensitivity slider for Matter sensors. Home Assistant plans to remove previous filtering by specific vendors and models, allowing any supported Matter sensor to operate across a full sensitivity range from 1 to 10, like Aqara Multi-State Sensor P100.
Heiman Smart motion sensor
A smart motion sensor with temperature compensation and real-time alarm notifications for reliable security monitoring.
Aqara Presence Multi-Sensor FP300
A multi-functional presence sensor with PIR and mmWave detection, designed for seamless smart home integration with Thread and Zigbee support.
Aqara Multi-State Sensor P100
Aqara Multi-State Sensor P100 delivers flexible, multi-condition motion and object monitoring with Matter-based smart home compatibility.
Matter lock improvements and bridge fixes
Building on the native lock management tools introduced last month, the new release adds fabric index fields to Matter lock user and credential responses. This gives you better visibility into how your smart locks are communicating across different ecosystems and administrator platforms. The update also corrects a minor issue where Matter electrical sensors were wrongly categorized as diagnostic entities, and it resolves availability state errors for bridged Matter devices to ensure your local network remains stable.
(Source: Home Assistant, GitHub; Image: Matter Alpha/Ward Zhou)
