The Latest Release of Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi Looks to Drive the Smart Home Market by Simplifying Smart Home Implementations

In November 2025, the Connectivity Standards Alliance (CSA) announced the release of its latest Zigbee 4.0 and Suzi specifications. Zigbee 4.0 simplifies smart home deployments by harmonizing the connectivity framework for traditional Zigbee and Smart Energy devices, while also introducing new security features and capabilities, such as Dynamic Link Key, Device Interview, and Smart Energy Authentication Level Control, to ensure greater network resiliency and protection. The new Zigbee 4.0 specifications also support device on-boarding and control via Bluetooth® Low Energy (LE) via Zigbee Direct, allowing end users to control devices without a Zigbee hub, while sleepy-to-sleepy communication using Coordinated Sample Listening (CSL) supports further optimized battery consumption and longer battery lives.

Suzi represents the new brand for Zigbee’s sub-Gigahertz (GHz) feature, adding long-range sub-GHz mesh networking capabilities to the Zigbee protocol. This feature is intended to support new smart living applications in outdoor areas, such as garage door sensors, gate locks, and/or lawn devices. The alliance reports that it plans to commence the Suzi Certification Program in 1H 2026.

Based on the latest development trends, ABI Research has observed some common strategic directions that are common across the different home connectivity protocols:

• The trend of adding sub-1 GHz capabilities to support longer-range connections is not new. Various other connectivity protocols, such as Wi-Fi HaLow, Z-Wave Long Range (LR), and Amazon Sidewalk, have also introduced their own versions of sub-1 GHz technology to support long-range use cases. Rather than being a differentiating feature, the integration of long-range capabilities is expected to be considered a standard feature for smart home protocols moving forward.
• Another interesting feature that Zigbee has added is the ability to onboard and control devices using Bluetooth® LE without the need for a Zigbee hub. This approach is similar to that of Matter, where Bluetooth® LE is typically used to simplify the process of device onboarding. It also adds resiliency to the network, ensuring that devices can still be controlled via Bluetooth®, LE even when the Thread or Zigbee network fails.
• Another requirement that has been and continues to be a key consideration is network security. Traditionally, the security standards used by Zigbee networks (i.e., 128-bit Advanced Encryption Standard (AES)) paled in comparison to the more advanced security standards used by other connectivity protocols. For example, Wi-Fi networks employ the Wi-Fi Protected Access 3 (WPA3) security protocol, while Z-Wave utilizes its S2 Security technology. It is no surprise that enhancing security and device authentication are key focus areas for the Zigbee 4.0 update.

While developing new features and capabilities is essential to ensuring greater adoption of the various home connectivity wireless protocols, it is equally important to build strong supply chain and ecosystem support to ensure that these home connectivity protocols can be easily integrated into the end devices. From observing the trends in the market, ABI Research recommends that home connectivity protocol organizations consider the following:

• Simplifying Certification Processes: Certification has been a cornerstone strategy for many wireless protocol organizations to ensure interoperability and maintain the baseline performance standard for its technology. However, this process could also turn out to be a bottleneck if implemented too stringently, leading to adoption challenges. Standard bodies need to consider how they can streamline the process. While there has already been some progress on this front (e.g., Bluetooth® and Thread certification can be inherited), the extension of such process simplifications to other protocols would be needed to drive adoption growth.
• Integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) into Software Development Kits (SDKs): To accelerate product and application development, chipset companies like Silicon Labs with its Simplicity AI SDK are launching AI-enabled SDKs to simplify the building process for developers. In light of this, standard bodies should work closely with such chipset companies to ensure that the tools, documentation, and workflows embedded in these SDKs remain highly relevant and useful.
• Working Closer with the Open-Source Community to Drive Innovation: While most of the home connectivity protocols are now open-source (i.e., Matter, Z-Wave, Zigbee, etc.), more can be done to tap into the developer community to build new applications and/or propose enhancements to the existing software stack. Forming stronger developer communities and/or organizing more developer conferences or hackathons are potential ways to tap into the wider developer ecosystem.

While the above development is mainly related to Zigbee, ABI Research expects the expanding Zigbee ecosystem to also benefit other home connectivity protocols, such as Thread and Matter. With smart speakers and hubs, such as Amazon Echo, supporting multiple connectivity protocols, homeowners are no longer bound to any one connectivity mode. With this complementary effect in mind, ABI Research foresees strong growth in the smart home devices market, with total shipments for smart home devices forecast to grow from 880 million shipments in 2023 to 1.5 billion by 2030, at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 7.1%. Notwithstanding the above, home connectivity protocol organizations should continue to ensure that their software stacks remain relevant, secure, and simple to implement.