After years of treating smart home products as a hobby, Apple is reportedly ready to launch an aggressive market push, with new home devices on the way and a new strategy centered around Apple Intelligence. Here's what's coming in 2025 and beyond.
Apple's new home strategy is built on three pillars
In his latest Power On newsletter, Mark Gurman laid out Apple's plans for a major push into the new smart home that will begin in 2025.
He detailed the three pillars of this new approach:
- Apple Intelligence with a Focus on Siri
- homeOS, a new software platform built on tvOS
- Broader accessory compatibility enabled by Matter
One of the most interesting details concerns how Apple plans to use AI within its future smart home products.
The company's goal is to use its new Apple Intelligence platform to offer home automation on steroids, as well as precise control over apps, devices, and media. A key part of Apple Intelligence is the new App Intents system, which allows the Siri digital assistant to control functions within apps.
Siri's ability to perform hundreds of new actions in apps isn't expected until next spring. But based on the data Apple has shared so far, the update could give Assistant a ton of new capabilities.
Imagine being able to perform a huge range of actions on your iPhone, iPad, and Mac without actually touching those devices — just by speaking out loud, anywhere in your home.
Smart Display with Apple Intelligence Expected in 2025
This new Siri capability could be especially well-suited to Apple's new Home device.
Here's where the expected smart display will appear in 2025.
Here's Gourmet:
One of the first big steps will be the release of a new smart display — something people can use to stream TV+ content, make FaceTime calls, surf the web, and access apps like Calendar and Notes. It will be an affordable screen similar to an iPad, and consumers will be able to place multiple devices around their home, just like they do with the HomePod mini.
Our own reports indicate that this product could feature a display that is square rather than rectangular, and include an A18 chip.
As much as I would love to see Apple Intelligence appear on existing HomePods, this could be a strong selling point for Apple’s new push into the smart home and its new products.
The smart display, Gurman said, won’t necessarily offer the best audio quality. Instead, it appears to complement the existing HomePods rather than replace them.
But a future, more expensive smart home product will offer a better music experience.
The desktop device, expected to arrive later, will be pricier — perhaps around $1,000 — and will focus on home security monitoring, advanced video conferencing, and media playback with high-quality audio. The screen will sit on a rotating robotic arm, which will help it stand out from competing products.
It’s unclear how this more expensive device will stand out for home security and video conferencing purposes. But “media playback with high-quality audio” is easy enough to understand.
It seems like the cheaper smart display could be positioned like the HomePod mini — affordable, but with compromises to fit into that budget price.
Best comment from Shane
If we can get to a point where I can issue multiple home commands at once, I’ll be thrilled! For example: Siri, close the garage door, turn the kitchen lights to 40%, make sure the front door is locked, and set the thermostat to 67. Automation is nice, but it requires the same routine every time. I want to be able to control multiple devices with a single command.
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Then the higher-end device would be more like a full-size HomePod with expanded capabilities, including better audio quality.
Apple Intelligence Smart Home Wrap Up
It's great to hear that Apple is planning a more aggressive approach to the smart home market. While the Apple TV 4K and HomePod have their loyal fans, including me, there's still a lot of potential for more diverse and powerful smart home products.
With Apple Intelligence at the center of these devices, I'm looking forward to seeing what comes of it.
Are you intrigued by Apple's smart home plans? What are you most looking forward to? Let us know in the comments.
