HomeKit Weekly: Unlock movie-quality smart home automations with Matter-enabled window shades

Of all the smart home products I’ve tried over the years, one stands out as making the biggest impact in my life day to day while also giving me the type of automation that was only available in the movies previously. I am talking about Matter-enabled window shades, and I just installed a new set in my bathroom, and it’s been incredible. This week, I am looking at the Canisteo Motorized Woven Woods window shades.

HomeKit Weekly is a series focused on smart home accessories, automation tips and tricks, and everything to do with Apple’s smart home framework.

Installation process

Overall, the installation of the Canisteo shades is easy as long as you measure correctly. I’ve embedded a video above showing how to measure, but once they arrive, you’ll drill a couple of brackets on the top of your window frame, and then you’re up and running. The shades have notches drilled out that a screw will slide into and then you’ll tighten up the shades with an included bolt. There is enough ‘wiggle room’ that you can work them in. Overall, it took me about 15 minutes per window to physically install them.

Once the Canisteo shades are installed, you’ll need to charge them to full capacity. A super long USB-C to USB-A cord is included in the box, but I noticed that one of my windows didn’t have a power outlet near it, so I improvised and used a USB battery pack to charge it up. Yes, I am a modern day MacGyver (or McGruber?). I let it charge for a few hours and then went to setup the rest of the experience. The motor has a green blinking light that will go to solid when it’s charged.

Programming the Canisteo shades

Included with the shades is a remote, and as much as I love the HomeKit access, I equally love having a remote. I absolutely hate when products only have a software component. The remote allows me to raise and lower them without worrying about Wi-Fi, HomeKit, etc. The remote comes pre-programmed, but if you buy multiple blinds, it’s incredibly simple to add them to an existing remote.

After the remote is configured, you can proceed with adding it to HomeKit. There is a Matter tag that’s on the back of the shade, but it’s also on the top as well. I would take the tag off and put it in a safe place, but know that there is a hidden one on the top as well. You’d have to physically take them off the mount to access it, but it’s better than losing it permanently. Once you add it to HomeKit, you can open and close the shades manually from the app or create scenes/automations to automatically handle it for you.

Wrap up

Overall, the Canisteo shades are fantastic. It’s been a major upgrade to our house. These Canisteo shades in particular are in my bathroom and one of the windows was behind the bathtub, so it was a bit of a challenge to manually open and close it each day. With the Canisteo Motorized Woven Woods, it’s a matter (pun-intended) of using my iPhone, Siri, or grabbing the included remote. Even without HomeKit, I’d love these shades, but with HomeKit support through Matter, it unlocks the type of automations that is normally reserved for movies with extremely rich people. You can buy the Canisteo Motorized Shades directly from Canisteo.