Apple’s long-rumored smart home push is getting an unlikely but familiar partner. According to new reporting from Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, Apple has worked closely with LG to develop a full lineup of smart home devices — seven products spanning doorbells, locks, cameras, thermostats and sensors — that LG will sell under its own brand. Apple reportedly helped shape both the features and the industrial design so the devices fit seamlessly into its smart home ecosystem.
The collaboration would give Apple something it has never really had: a day-one hardware lineup for the home that it didn’t have to manufacture, market or support itself. With Apple expected to unveil its new HomeView smart home hub, a refreshed HomePod mini and a new Apple TV 4K at its “Welcome home” event on October 13, the LG accessories would flesh out the ecosystem story on day one.
The Seven LG Devices
Reporting has so far named seven products in the LG-branded lineup:
- LG Video Doorbell Wired – a connected video doorbell.
- LG Floodlight Cam – an outdoor camera with an integrated floodlight.
- LG Outdoor Cam Plug-In – a plug-powered outdoor security camera.
- LG Indoor Cam Plug-In – a plug-powered indoor security camera.
- LG Smart Deadbolt Lock – a smart lock that may include ultra-wideband so it can unlock automatically as an authorized user approaches.
- LG Smart Thermostat – a smart thermostat for climate control.
- LG Temperature Sensor – a room-level temperature sensor, likely a companion to the thermostat.
Together, the lineup reads like a direct answer to the product catalogs Apple has spent years ceding to Ring, Nest and Ecobee: entry, climate and monitoring covered in one coordinated wave.
Matter, Thread and UWB Under the Hood
According to the reports, all of the LG devices are expected to support Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Thread and Matter. That protocol stack matters more than it might seem. Matter and Thread are the open standards Apple has been backing for years — Apple TV and HomePod devices already act as Thread border routers and Matter controllers — so the LG hardware should slot into Apple Home setups as natively as anything Apple makes itself.
The standout detail is ultra-wideband in the smart deadbolt lock. UWB enables precise distance and direction sensing, which would let the lock distinguish between someone standing at the door and someone merely passing by — a smarter, more secure trigger for automatic unlocking than Bluetooth proximity alone. Apple already uses UWB for hands-free unlocking in HomeKey-compatible locks and for precision finding in AirTags, so bringing it to a door lock is a natural extension.
FCC Filings Signal Progress — But Don’t Hold Your Breath
LG has begun the U.S. regulatory process, filing the devices for testing with the FCC. The filings include technical drawings, while the actual test photos remain sealed under confidentiality requests — a routine but telling sign that hardware development is well underway and that LG is keeping the final designs under wraps for now.
The timeline, however, appears to have slipped. Gurman reports that the LG accessories are not expected to be available for several months, putting them well after the October 13 event. That gap is consistent with how Apple has handled partner accessories before: announce the ecosystem vision, ship the core devices, and let the accessories land when they’re ready.
Apple’s “Second-Party” Playbook
This is not a new move for Apple — it’s the return of one. The company has a long history of co-developing products with third-party manufacturers for categories it considers lower priority for in-house development, expanding its ecosystem without taking on the full cost and complexity of producing and supporting a wide accessory range. Past collaborators include Belkin and Logitech, and Apple previously partnered with LG on the UltraFine displays it sold before reentering the monitor market itself in 2022.
The smart home accessories fit the pattern perfectly: doorbells, thermostats and cameras are high-volume, support-intensive products where Apple’s differentiation is in software, privacy and ecosystem integration — not in bending sheet metal. Working with LG reportedly wouldn’t stop Apple from making its own accessories, either. One Apple-branded product said to be in development is a battery-powered security sensor that would function like a camera but record no video, instead relying on Apple Intelligence to detect and describe events. That device is reportedly slated for 2027.
Gurman has also floated further steps down the road: a privacy-centric home-monitoring device, a version of the smart home hub mounted on a robotic arm, and even an in-home security monitoring service — signals that Apple views the LG partnership as an opening act, not the whole show.
What It Means for Your Smart Home
If the reporting holds, Apple’s home strategy is becoming a two-track effort: Apple builds the hubs, the voice assistant and the platform, while trusted partners build the commodity hardware — all glued together by Matter, Thread and the Home app. For iPhone owners, that could finally mean an Apple-sanctioned doorbell, lock and thermostat that work with HomeKit out of the box, no third-party guesswork required.
The obvious caveats apply: Apple has not confirmed any of this, pricing is unknown, and the devices are reportedly months away. The October 13 event will be the first reality check — watch for how prominently Apple talks about partner accessories and whether Matter and Thread get top billing. If they do, the LG lineup stops looking like a rumor and starts looking like the opening of Apple’s real smart home era.