IKEA might be expanding its own line of Apple HomeKit ready smart home products

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HomeKit add-ons, courtesy of IKEA.

IKEA smart home
(Image credit: IKEA)

It’s not just Billy bookcases and meatballs you can pick up at IKEA — the Swedish home furnishings retailer also has a growing line of own-brand electronics products. And its next launch will be very enticing for those with an Apple HomeKit smart home set up, if the latest leaks are anything to go by.

As spotted by Zatz Not Funny, IKEA is planning to release two new smart home sensors, as filed with the Federal Communications (FCC) department in June.

The first is the ‘Parasoll Open / Close’ sensor, which monitors opening and closing actions on a device, such as doors and windows, communicating wirelessly with smart home controllers and making use of a magnetic fob. Going purely by the name, it seems intended perhaps for use with a patio or garden parasol’s open and close mechanism.

The second product, the Vallhorn Motion sensor, is, as its name suggests, a motion sensor that could presumably be paired with other smart home items to trigger actions based on movement or proximity.

At this point, no release or pricing information has been revealed.

HomeKit future

Though the devices themselves make use of the Zigbee smart home standard — which itself is not compatible with Apple’s HomeKit, both look set to require a connection to IKEA’s own Dirigera or Tradfi smart home hubs, which are HomeKit compatible, bridging the gap between the two standards.

It’s a bit of a faff, admittedly, and speaks to the fractured nature of Apple HomeKit support when it comes to third-party systems. But this might soon be a thing of the past — the Matter smart home standard, set to unify all major smart home systems, is compatible with HomeKit and will increasingly become the de facto standard for all manufacturers to support.

In the meantime, there remains a healthy, if small, HomeKit ecosystem to invest in. Check out our top picks for HomeKit gear at the links below:

Gerald Lynch
Gerald Lynch
Editor in Chief

Gerald Lynch is the Editor-in-Chief of iMore, keeping careful watch over the site's editorial output and commercial campaigns, ensuring iMore delivers the in-depth, accurate and timely Apple content its readership deservedly expects. You'll never see him without his iPad Pro, and he loves gaming sessions with his buddies via Apple Arcade on his iPhone 15 Pro, but don't expect him to play with you at home unless your Apple TV is hooked up to a 4K HDR screen and a 7.1 surround system. 

Living in London in the UK, Gerald was previously Editor of Gizmodo UK, and Executive Editor of TechRadar, and has covered international trade shows including Apple's WWDC, MWC, CES and IFA. If it has an acronym and an app, he's probably been there, on the front lines reporting on the latest tech innovations. Gerald is also a contributing tech pundit for BBC Radio and has written for various other publications, including T3 magazine, GamesRadar, Space.com, Real Homes, MacFormat, music bible DIY, Tech Digest, TopTenReviews, Mirror.co.uk, Brandish, Kotaku, Shiny Shiny and Lifehacker. Gerald is also the author of 'Get Technology: Upgrade Your Future', published by Aurum Press, and also holds a Guinness world record on Tetris. For real.