---
title: HMCharacteristicMetadata
framework: homekit
role: symbol
role_heading: Class
path: homekit/hmcharacteristicmetadata
---

# HMCharacteristicMetadata

Metadata that describes a characteristic’s value and that may be useful for presentation purposes.

## Declaration

```swift
class HMCharacteristicMetadata
```

## Overview

Overview Querying a characteristic’s metadata enables you to build a user interface that reflects the underlying units, minima, and maxima, and other aspects of the characteristic value.

## Topics

### Describing a characteristic

- [manufacturerDescription](homekit/hmcharacteristicmetadata/manufacturerdescription.md)

### Bounding the value

- [validValues](homekit/hmcharacteristicmetadata/validvalues.md)
- [minimumValue](homekit/hmcharacteristicmetadata/minimumvalue.md)
- [maximumValue](homekit/hmcharacteristicmetadata/maximumvalue.md)
- [stepValue](homekit/hmcharacteristicmetadata/stepvalue.md)
- [maxLength](homekit/hmcharacteristicmetadata/maxlength.md)

### Formatting the value

- [format](homekit/hmcharacteristicmetadata/format.md)
- [Characteristic Data Formats](homekit/characteristic-data-formats.md)

### Specifying units

- [units](homekit/hmcharacteristicmetadata/units.md)
- [Characteristic Units](homekit/characteristic-units.md)

### Initializers

- [init()](homekit/hmcharacteristicmetadata/init().md)

## Relationships

### Inherits From

- [NSObject](objectivec/nsobject-swift.class.md)

### Conforms To

- [CVarArg](swift/cvararg.md)
- [CustomDebugStringConvertible](swift/customdebugstringconvertible.md)
- [CustomStringConvertible](swift/customstringconvertible.md)
- [Equatable](swift/equatable.md)
- [Hashable](swift/hashable.md)
- [NSObjectProtocol](objectivec/nsobjectprotocol.md)
- [Sendable](swift/sendable.md)
- [SendableMetatype](swift/sendablemetatype.md)

## See Also

### Managing characteristic presentation

- [metadata](homekit/hmcharacteristic/metadata.md)