Apple just announced a new gadget that could be key to its AI push

By Lisa Eadicicco, CNN

(CNN) — Apple on Tuesday announced the HomeView, its biggest push into the smart home market in nearly a decade.

The new device gives Apple’s revamped version of Siri a presence in consumers’ homes, making it a critical piece of Apple’s AI strategy.

The HomeView has a 7-inch screen connected to a speaker on its base, and Apple will also sell a version that can be mounted on a wall.

It costs $299 and is available for preorder starting today ahead of its November 13 launch.

Apple has been selling its HomePod smart speakers since 2017, but those devices have failed to gain widespread traction. Amazon and Google ran away with the smart speaker market in the late 2010s, leaving the iPhone maker with just a slice of the market.

Apple only accounted for 5.2% of the smart speaker market in 2025, while Amazon accounted for 40.9% and Google was responsible for 29%, according to market research firm The International Data Corporation.

But the rise of AI assistants has sparked a renewed push across the tech industry to create devices that rely on voice input rather than typing or swiping. HomeView has a touchscreen, but Apple is also positioning it as being an easier way to talk to Siri at home without having to reach for your phone.

Siri AI on the HomeView will be able to show relevant information based on context from a users’ text messages and calendar, and Apple says it will be able to recognize up to six household members by their face. Conversations with Siri on the HomeView will also sync across devices.

Apple says data from the device’s camera and microphone are processed separately from the rest of the system so that it cannot be accessed by the device’s software, apps, Apple or the user. Content from a user’s messages or calendar only appears on the device when the user is recognized.

The device could be key in popularizing Siri AI considering Apple’s upgraded assistant only works on the iPhone 15 Pro and later. That means family members with older iPhones that don’t support Apple’s AI features will be able to try Siri AI on the new smart home device.

Apple is also promoting the device as being ideal for managing smart home devices, making FaceTime calls, listening to music and serving as a digital photo frame. Since it can recognize users, it changes the home screen’s apps and widgets depending on the person. Similar to the Apple Watch, the HomeView also has a variety of different faces for displaying information based on the users’ preferences, like calendars, photos and weather data.

The HomeView is one of several new gadgets launched under new Apple CEO John Ternus, following the debut of Apple’s first foldable iPhone last month.

Apple on Tuesday also announced a new version of the HomePod Mini, an updated Apple TV 4K with Siri AI and a collection of smart home devices designed in collaboration with LG and Schneider Electric.

Apple has faced pressure to prove it can come up with a new hit product for the age of AI. Analysts have pressed Apple executives on earnings calls about whether it plans to develop new AI-powered gadgets.

Apple is part of an industry-wide race to create personalized AI assistants that consumers rely on for everyday tasks. Tech giants are preparing for a potential future in which people get things done by speaking or typing to AI agent rather than by operating apps and websites. Meta recently launched its Muse personal assistant, along with a new slate of smart glasses designed to give users easier access to its new AI helper. OpenAI is also developing several hardware gadgets.

Apple is betting that its focus on privacy and the fact that consumers already run their digital lives on its iPhones, iPads and Macs will give it an edge. The HomeView, with its ability to alter the home screen depending on who is interacting with it, follows that strategy.

But Apple has also insisted that consumers don’t need a new type of gadget to get the most out of AI, with Ternus saying at an event last month that “there’s no product in the world better designed” to be a personal hub than the iPhone.

The-CNN-Wire
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