Hi there, I'm having the same issue and was wondering if there's been any update or solution to this?
I purchased a Hue lighting system and have the Philips Hue Hub connected to the back of my router via LAN cable. I downloaded the Hue app and have managed to find the Hue Hub on the network and set my lights up etc. However, the problem starts when I try and add the hub as a bridge in the Apple Home app (HomeKit). It cannot find the Hub.
What's interesting is that this isn't the only bridge issue that I have. When I moved to my new home a year ago, the heating system comes with a bridge so the the thermostats can be controlled via app and/or added to Apple HomeKit. Whilst I've managed to get this working in the native app on my iPhone, when I try and add the bridge to HomeKit, it doesn't see the bridge.
Having read some other threads on other forums, I wonder if this is to do with how Apple's HomeKit service uses 'Bonjour' as a way to find devices? Someone suggested downloading a 'Discovery' (not the streaming service ;-)) app and to look at the _hap._tcp. list to see if my bridge devices are in the list. I've done this, and I cannot see them. Other threads talk about how some security settings on the router may be inhibiting this. But I'm not sure what sort of settings I'd need to change to get around this?
Because these bridges are clearly on my local network - I can see them displayed when I log into the Virgin Hub 3.0 as connected via ethernet, and the fact that I can use the native apps to control the devices connected to these bridges, suggests that there is something in the Virgin Hub settings that is stopping Apple HomeKit from being able to see these bridges and add them.
I don't have any issues with smart home devices that I connect directly into HomeKit by clicking the 'add' button in the Apple Home app and then simply scanning the QR code on the smart home device. It's only a problem when the smart home HomeKit device e.g. Philips Hue, requires you to add a bridge to the router.
I've seen so many posts from people across various internet forums with the same issue. But no clear, straightforward resolution.
Given that many people will be using a Virgin Hub router as part of their smart home setup, and with popular products light Philips Hue lighting out there, is it possible that someone at Virgin could look into this and find a solution? There is a strong suggestion that its all down to security settings. Can someone that knows about the Virgin router security settings and with knowledge of how HomeKit security protocols need to be set in a certain way, look into this, please? I can't seem to use any smart home bridges until this is resolved. I used to be on BT before I moved, and had no problem with bridges connected to the BT router. When I moved, I switched to Virgin and so I can only assume that its the router that is the problem here.
Notes on my setup:
I have a Linksys Velop system with 3 nodes connected as well. One node goes into the router via LAN and the other two connect to the first node through wireless. I did try and run the router in 'modem mode' when I first went to setup the mesh network and this made everything stop working, I had to do a hard reset of the Virgin Hub and get it back to its previous condition to make this work again. But as others have suggested, its not necessarily the 'modem mode' that is the issue here. It's whatever security settings are blocking these bridges from being discovered - in my case, by Apple HomeKit.
Hope someone can help / there's a solution out there! 🙂 Thank you.
