Apple’s HomePad is built to be shared by a whole household, so it has to know who is standing in front of it. The smart home hub is designed to use its front camera, your voice and nearby iPhones to show each person their own messages, calendar and photos.
The details come from a video by Front Page Tech, which expects Apple to show the hub on October 13 alongside a new Apple TV 4K and the HomePod mini 2.
HomePad Reportedly Recognizes You by Its Camera, Your Voice, and the iPhone in Your Pocket
A shared screen cannot show one person’s life to everyone in the room. Each person has their own unread messages, calendar invites, notes, widgets and photos, and the HomePad changes what it shows as someone walks up to it.
The hub identifies you with a FaceTime camera, the same kind Apple uses on other devices, so it is not as precise as Face ID. The video says Apple backs the camera up with other cues:
- Voice recognition
- Your iPhone and your other HomePods
- Nearby iPhone signals, which let the hub tell who is closest by whose iPhone is in a pocket
Apple is expected to pitch the hub as a portal into Siri AI. The video describes Siri AI as the main way to use it, since the hub is not meant to be picked up and handled like an iPad.
HomePad Has No Battery and Is Meant to Stay on a Counter or Wall
There is no battery inside, so the hub stays plugged in. It is meant for a kitchen counter or a wall mount, not for carrying from room to room.
The design borrows from the iMac G4. The video describes a display about as thick as an iPhone, with narrow bezels, rounded corners and a FaceTime camera. It floats above a round metal base with speaker cutouts, joined by a single polished metal arm.
Jony Ive designed the original iMac G4 nearly 25 years ago. The video argues that reusing the look gives Apple a nostalgic hook for longtime fans, and that the design alone makes the product worth a look.
Apple Is Expected to Announce the Hub With a Produced Video, Not a Full Keynote
The video does not expect a stage keynote on October 13. It points to how Apple announced the redesigned Mac mini, with a polished online video, and says most of the promotion will come from the creators and press Apple invited to New York.
That fits Apple’s invite for an in-person Welcome Home experience in Tribeca. Apple has not said whether it will livestream the event.
A refreshed Apple TV 4K and the HomePod mini 2 are expected around the same time. The touchscreen MacBook Pro and other Macs are not part of that day. The video expects them closer to the end of October or in November, on a separate press cycle so the hub gets its own attention. That matches an earlier report that the touchscreen MacBook Pro and OLED iPad mini are coming on October 27.
Earlier reports point to a price of around $350 for the hub, and our guide to the Apple smart home hub collects everything reported so far. The Welcome Home press experience starts at 9:00 a.m. ET on Tuesday, October 13, which is 6:00 a.m. Pacific.
