Make using video doorbells feel like established camera integrations

Problem statement

General camera support has been around for quite a while.

Recently, also Matter 1.5 introduced official support for video doorbells alongside cameras, bringing functionality that previously required vendor-specific integrations or custom configuration. However, simply implementing the Matter specification isn't enough as users expect the same polished, feature-rich experience they already get from established integrations like Reolink.

While there are already vendor specific options to get Matter video doorbells "to work" with Home Assistant (take Aqara's Matter signals as an example) they are not quite in-line with an open approach.

This opportunity defines the baseline that Matter video doorbell support in Home Assistant needs to meet, before further iteration can happen and builds upon #40

For full context on Matter camera support, see the related document.

For further reference, below you see the current HomeAssistant representation of a Matter video doorbell (Aqara G410) that just exposes "Identify" by default and also shows Aqara's custom Matter signal "Door bell ringing" created to be automated upon:

This opportunity is not targeted to only Matter video door bells but to get video door bells on a good experience in Home Assistant.

Community signals

Increasing traction due to recent Matter 1.5 and Matter camera push

https://forum.aqara.com/t/integrating-the-aqara-g410-doorbell-with-third-party-platforms-home-assistant-and-homey-pro/247856

Scope & Boundaries

In scope

In a first step focus on the essentials to iterate on going forward
- Ring detection and automations to build upon
- Camera feed (from Matter is upgraded to 1.5.1 to enable Matter camera support #40)
- Activity log

Not in scope

Any non-happy-path use cases

Foreseen solution

UI proposal: Camera more-info dialog design concept ux-design#19

Risks & open questions

Matter is upgraded to 1.5.1 to enable Matter camera support #40 will also show how far we can go in a consecutive step
Only few Matter video door bells on the market still

Appetite

Medium - 1-2 cycles from frontend and potentially backend perspective

Execution issues

No response

Decision log

Date	Decision	Outcome

I really like the idea of laying the groundwork for future Matter camera and doorbell support - especially since it seems to include two-way audio. The “Camera in Home Assistant” document sounds very promising.

That said, I’m a bit concerned that focusing purely on Matter might be too limiting. As also discussed in #40, real-world availability is still quite limited. In practice, most homes already have established doorbell systems rather than Matter-native devices.

From what I see around me, friends who are currently building or renovating their homes usually choose established doorbell systems from well-known brands. A camera on its own doesn’t really solve the full use case - it also needs doorbell functionality itself. I ended up in the same situation about a couple of years ago and chose DoorBird. I haven’t seen any significant Matter adoption among these typical products yet.

I’ve used Loxone as Smart Home for years and still rely on parts of it in the background of HA. One thing I’ve always appreciated is its doorbell integration that combines video streaming, event handling, two-way audio and action buttons such as IR mode or door opener in a nice UI. I believe it is based on SIP and MJPEG standards.

I would love to see a more generic and flexible approach: a modular system that fully supports Matter, but also integrates well with existing and widely used doorbell solutions. By the way, the UI draft in #40 already looks great and seems like a solid foundation for this.

I’m not entirely sure if this is the right place for this feedback, so apologies if not. I felt encouraged to comment after your request for feedback on the roadmap item in May release :) I’d definitely love to see this aspect explored further. Happy to exchange ideas and also support testing with my current setup if that helps and you're interested!

I would love to see a more generic and flexible approach: a modular system that fully supports Matter, but also integrates well with existing and widely used doorbell solutions. By the way, the UI draft in #40 already looks great and seems like a solid foundation for this.

Agree.

While this opportunity is framed around Matter we should always aim for a generic approach and solution, so I agree with both your remarks.

Referring to the overarching goal to OpenHomeFoundation/goals#15 a solution should not be tailored to Matter specifically, but we would rather see that one as a starter to further built upon / sync for other protocols as well.

It's much like the approach aimed for cameras in HA which starts by adding #119 and then ideally also generically #120.

Update:

Work on home-assistant/developers.home-assistant#201 has been picked up recently - which is a prerequisite for this opportunity.

For this opportunity to continue further I'd like to put the focus again on the UI perspective as initially started here:

Camera more-info dialog design concept ux-design#19

I'd be interested on views in this discussion regarding specifically also the UX flow for when someone rings the door and actions that should be shown / available to be taken.

Thus, moving this opportunity to Shaping.

@thomasgregg

For this opportunity to continue further I'd like to put the focus again on the UI perspective as initially started here:

Camera more-info dialog design concept ux-design#19

I'd be interested on views in this discussion regarding specifically also the UX flow for when someone rings the door and actions that should be shown / available to be taken.

FYI, posted a tip in #201 that seen on Reddit: @thomasgregg made a custom component integration and a matching frontend card called "HomeCall" which could perhaps even be used as a base to build for this UI or else just use for inspiration here? Check out these links for it:

https://github.com/thomasgregg/homecall

and

https://github.com/thomasgregg/homecall-card

While it currently only seems to have one-way support it sounds like it has a announcing/sending part down, so "only" missing receiving part. Could maybe be extended with two-way intercom for room-to-room when using ESPHome, however unsure if two-way intercom could be made possible for room-to-room with third-party like Amazon Echo and Google Nest speakers?

https://www.reddit.com/r/homeassistant/comments/1wycu0s/homecall_an_intercom_for_home_assistant_using/

Anyway, the cards looks very nice, and again its interface for the announcement/send part seem well thought out. Screenshots from Reddit:

Adding a data point from the Reolink side, since it's mentioned here as the reference experience.

I've got two-way audio working fully local in reolink_aio (starkillerOG/reolink_aio#219), straight over Reolink's own protocol, with no go2rtc and no RTSP. Tested on the Video Doorbell PoE, a TrackMix PoE and an Argus MagiCam, a battery cam that has no RTSP at all.

What I think would make doorbells feel native in HA, on both http and https:

The speaker as a media player. Audio generated on the server (TTS, recorded messages, alerts) doesn't need the browser mic, so it works on plain http. It also turns every doorbell or camera with a speaker into a notification speaker that any automation can use ("someone's at the door", "leave the package by the door", alarms).
Live talk. This needs https or the companion app for the mic (Introduce two-way audio support for compatible devices #201). It would help if the camera/doorbell entity could take the mic audio and hand it to the integration, not only through the go2rtc RTSP backchannel. Integrations like Reolink have a native talk channel that also covers battery cams, and on current Reolink doorbell firmware the RTSP backchannel is PCMU, which still comes out garbled in go2rtc (Fix Reolink Doorbell two-way audio on PCMU firmware AlexxIT/go2rtc#2353).
One doorbell entity that ties the ring event, live view, speaker and talk together, so the UI (Camera more-info dialog design concept ux-design#19) can show it the same way for every brand.

With the media player from point 1 in the integration, this completes the solution for starkillerOG/reolink_aio#161 (TTS and two-way audio on Reolink cameras). Happy to do the Reolink integration side for 1 and 2.

This opportunity defines the baseline that Matter video doorbell support in Home Assistant needs to meet, before further iteration can happen and builds upon #40 For full context on Matter camera support, see the related document.

For reference, Matter JS server added two-way audio ("talkback" two-way talk support) for Matter-based cameras in the API and dashboard:

feat(camera): opt-in talkback (two-way audio) in the API and dashboard matter-js/matterjs-server#1141
- feat(camera): Matter camera stream management over the WebSocket API matter-js/matterjs-server#1081

FYI, here are also addtional links to previous pull requests and related discussions or tracking issues for reference:

There are as well feature requests related to two-way audio doorbells and intercoms functionality between voice assistants or apps:

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Make using video doorbells feel like established camera integrations #84

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Make using video doorbells feel like established camera integrations #84

Description

Problem statement

Community signals

Scope & Boundaries

In scope

Not in scope

Foreseen solution

Risks & open questions

Appetite

Execution issues

Decision log

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flod-1 commented on May 17, 2026

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