CES 2024: Amazon Unveils Matter Casting Standard as Interoperable Alternative to AirPlay

Amazon today announced Matter Casting, an interoperable rival to Apple's AirPlay feature, at CES 2024 (via Bloomberg).

echo show
Matter Casting will initially only support streaming content from Amazon's Prime Video app to Echo Show devices, but the feature will support Fire TV in the coming months. Later in the year, it will work across a range of other video services, including Plex, Starz, Pluto TV, Sling TV, and ZDF.

‌AirPlay‌ allows Apple device users to wirelessly stream video from an iPhone, iPad, or Mac to an Apple TV or another Mac, as well as stream audio from almost any Apple device to any HomePod, ‌Apple TV‌, or compatible third-party speaker. Google has a similar equivalent for its Chromecast devices called Google Cast. Both ‌AirPlay‌ and Google Cast are proprietary technologies, so Amazon's new feature is designed to be interoperable across platforms.

Apple and Google worked with Amazon on the Matter home standard, but they have not yet announced any plans to support Matter Casting and could choose to remain uninvolved. Nevertheless, it is clearly Amazon's wish to make video streaming apps and TV accessories work together more seamlessly, regardless of their platform.

Popular Stories

maxresdefault

Apple Releases iOS 18.4 With Priority Notifications, Ambient Music, New Emoji and More

Monday March 31, 2025 10:03 am PDT by
Apple today released iOS 18.4 and iPadOS 18.4, the fourth major updates to the iOS 18 and iPadOS 18 operating system updates that came out last year. iOS 18.4 and iPadOS 18.4 come two months after Apple released iOS 18.3 and iPadOS 18.3. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. The new software can be downloaded on eligible iPhones and iPads over-the-air by going to...
iPhone 17 Pro 34ths Perspective

iPhone 17 Pro Launching Later This Year With These 10 New Features

Sunday March 23, 2025 10:00 am PDT by
While the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are not expected to launch until September, there are already plenty of rumors about the devices. Below, we recap key changes rumored for the iPhone 17 Pro models as of March 2025: Aluminum frame: iPhone 17 Pro models are rumored to have an aluminum frame, whereas the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro models have a titanium frame, and the iPhone ...
top stories 2025 03 29

Top Stories: WWDC 2025 Announced, iPhone 17 Pro and iOS 19 Rumors, and More

Saturday March 29, 2025 6:00 am PDT by
Apple's big developer event is a little over two months away, and rumors about what we can expect to see in Apple's next major operating system updates are becoming increasingly frequent. A public release of iOS 18.4 is also imminent with a number of updates and improvements, although we won't be getting the major Apple Intelligence Siri upgrades that had reportedly been planned for this...
iOS 19 Mock WWDC25 Feature

iOS 19 Expected to Run on These iPhones

Monday March 31, 2025 5:28 pm PDT by
iOS 19 will not be available on the iPhone XR, iPhone XS, or the iPhone XS Max, according a private account on social media site X that has accurately provided information on device compatibility in the past. The iPhone XR, iPhone XS, and iPhone XS Max all have an A12 Bionic chip, so it looks like iOS 19 will discontinue support for that chip. All other iPhones that run iOS 18 are expected...
Magic Mouse Green

What to Expect From the Magic Mouse 3

Saturday March 29, 2025 10:15 am PDT by
Apple is reportedly working on a new Magic Mouse. Below, we recap what to expect. The two key rumors for the Magic Mouse 3 so far include a relocated charging port, along with a more ergonomic design. It was briefly rumored that the Magic Mouse 3 would also feature voice control, but that was misinterpreted information. Relocated Charging Port While the Magic Mouse switched from...
iOS 18

iOS 18.4 Expected Next Week - Here Are the Release Notes

Friday March 28, 2025 2:01 pm PDT by
With the second release candidate of iOS 18.4 that Apple seeded out today, the company finally provided us with release notes that give a full rundown on what to expect. There's an Apple Vision Pro app, new Apple Intelligence features for notifications and additional language support, plus an Apple News Food feature for Apple News+ subscribers, and several updates that should improve the...
Foldable iPhone 2023 Feature Homescreen

Six Things to Know About Apple's Upcoming Foldable iPhone

Friday March 28, 2025 3:54 pm PDT by
We've been hearing rumors about a foldable iPhone for almost a decade now, but it looks like we might finally see the device come to fruition in 2026. We're going to be waiting many more months for the foldable iPhone, but so far we're hearing good things. Apple wants to make it creaseless. It's taken Apple multiple years to design a foldable iPhone that it's satisfied with because Apple ...
iOS 19 visionOS UI Elements

Apple Codename Provides Clue About iOS 19's Rumored New Design

Sunday March 30, 2025 6:40 am PDT by
Multiple sources have claimed that iOS 19 will introduce a new design with more translucent buttons, menus, notification banners, and more, and there is now another clue that points towards this glass-like appearance. Bloomberg's Mark Gurman today said the new design project is codenamed "Solarium" internally. A solarium is a room with glass walls that allow in plenty of sunlight, so this...

Top Rated Comments

brijazz Avatar
16 months ago
"Anything you cast will be interrupted by an ad every 20 minutes unless you give us an extra $2.99/month." - Amazon in six months, probably
Score: 32 Votes (Like | Disagree)
clebingames Avatar
16 months ago
Some crucial differences in how The Verge present this.

MacRumors: "Amazon today announced Matter Casting, an interoperable rival to Apple's AirPlay feature"

The Verge: "Amazon, one of the founders of Matter, is the first to add support for Matter casting, a feature of the Matter smart home standard"

Elsewhere (Techhive): "The new open casting standard is called Matter Casting, and yes, it’s part of the Matter smart home standard. At CES this week, Amazon announced that it will roll out Matter Casting to Fire TV and Echo Show 15 devices."

Seems like sloppy wording at the top of this article.
Score: 20 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Porco Avatar
16 months ago
The xkcd ('https://xkcd.com/927/') that never stops being relevant…



Attachment Image
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
BuffaloTF Avatar
16 months ago

Forgive my cynicism, but I feel like Apple is only implementing the RCS as a means of staving off accusations of anti-competitiveness. I wouldn't hold your breath waiting for them to implement another protocol (if they even can... this is proprietary I'd assume).
I have the opposite feeling here. Matter is in its name, but Amazon is the one to be cynical of here. All my HomeKit devices play nicely with Matter, I can control them with Alexa commands. Anything “Made for Alexa” though… no way to set it up to Matter. There’s a Matter section in the app, but it’s to add external Matter devices to its device list, not to connect it to the service to open up its devices to other assistants. Even 3rd party devices I linked to my Hue hub that were previously no bueno on Home are now there with Philips adding Matter. It’s not really inspiring confidence here.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
WarmWinterHat Avatar
16 months ago
I'd rather there be a fully open, non-patented or proprietary casting protocol that everyone implements, on device, but Google and Apple don't want to let you out of the ecosystem. I don't see this helping too much. Matter doesn't seem to matter (ha) much, either, since it's not being implimented in a meaningful way.

We have Google Nest audio at our house... I can't send music with Apple Music, from my phone, to the device (I use Spotify now). I have an Homepod in my office, but my wife can't send music to it with her Pixel.

It's a garbage landscape, currently.
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)
G5isAlive Avatar
16 months ago

Isn't this what DLNA is supposed to have done for the past 20 years? Maybe people have figured out better ways to do this since then, and it's easier to make something new than fix DLNA which doesn't work the best, but maybe not.
The implementations of DLNA that I have seen are more like being a file server than serving files directly (if that makes sense). In other words it allowed me to browser around on different devices but not really just do it directly.

Anyway, here's hoping Apple adopts this without necessarily giving up its own tech, the same way they are broadening the use of Messages.
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)