At CES 2024 in Las Vegas, Amazon announced that it is the first major company to support the Matter open casting standard. Matter Casting is an open protocol that enables the transmission of videos and related content from an app to a hardware device, similar to Apple AirPlay and Google Chromecast. The feature has been launched for the Prime Video app, allowing casting to various Amazon hardware devices.
Initially, casting is only supported on the Echo Show 15 smart display, but Amazon plans to extend support to Fire TVs, including Panasonic models with built-in Fire TV. Prime Video is currently the sole content streaming partner, but Amazon has promised to add more options later this year, including Plex, Pluto, Sling TV, Starz, and others.
The Matter cast feature operates similarly to AirPlay – users open the Prime Video app, tap the cast button, and select an appropriate hardware device. Notably, Matter cast is not tied to a specific smartphone operating system and is available to any app and hardware maker interested in implementing the feature.
The introduction of Matter Casting by Amazon is part of the open-source Matter smart home protocol, which is jointly supported by Amazon, Apple, and Google. However, it is unlikely that Google and Apple will embrace this particular feature set, given that each company has its own established casting standard. For example, Google recently announced at CES that Chromecast will be integrated into all new LG TVs, with no mention of Matter cast.
Amazon advocates for adopting an open-casting platform by major tech companies, aiming to streamline the current array of competing models. Chris DeCenzo, a principal engineer at Amazon, expressed the company’s belief in open standards, emphasizing their simplification for developers.
While the universal adoption of Matter cast by all major players may not be immediate, significant strides have been made in incorporating other aspects of the Matter smart home standard. Google’s smart home devices are integrated with the protocol, and the same applies to Amazon devices like Echo speakers.
