Leaks about Apple’s new smart home products have been interesting pieces of news to follow in the smart home industry for the last year or so, and they show no signs of slowing down. This hype appears to be real, with a recent Bloomberg report revealing new information about a new smart home display from Cupertino.
According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, Apple’s upcoming smart home display, expected to be revealed sometime next year, will include an iMac-like base with a square display that is about the size of two iPhones side by side.
The screen will be positioned at an angle on the small base, which Gurman writes is similar to the iMac G4, an all-in-one personal computer from Apple that was sold in the early 2000s. The unnamed smart home display’s base will include speakers, which basically makes it a HomePod with a screen, Gurman writes.
The Apple journalist says the small form factor means that the product will be relatively cheap and easy to deploy in different rooms in a home. As reported before and covered by CE Pro, the device is expected to run on a new operating system designed for smart home use and will include many common Apple apps, such as FaceTime, Notes, and Calendar. The device is also well-suited for videos and photo slideshows, similar to the other smart home displays from Amazon and Google.
However, the main use case for the device will be a smart home controller, Gurman writes.
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This particular device is expected to be unveiled sometime next year, possibly in the Spring, but Apple’s smart home ambitions won’t stop there, as the company is also working on a higher-end device with a larger screen that will be controlled via a robotic arm. However, this likely won’t be released until 2026, Gurman says.
While the iPad remains a popular home control interface, Apple apparently wants a larger chunk of the smart home market. To that end, it has revamped many of its popular devices and operating systems to be easier to use for smart home control. iOS, iPadOS, and tvOS have all had major recent updates that make controlling a user’s smart home easier and more efficient.
CEDIA Market Keeping an Eye on Apple’s Smart Home Ambitions
Apple devices are not uncommon in the custom home integration market, and many manufacturers even support Apple devices with mounts and integrations. Wall-Smart makes sleek-looking iPad mounts and several home control platforms like Savant and Control4 integrate well with Apple products like HomeKit and Siri.
Savant’s inception was largely thanks to running on Apple software, but this deep integration with Apple software is relatively new for Control4. We caught up with Greg Simmons, vice president of industry partnerships at Control4 parent company Snap One, at HSTA’s Fall Conference, who said the company is keeping an eye on Apple’s apparently growing smart home business.
“That was a key element for us,” Simmons says of the Apple integrations, specifically the manufacturer’s new Control4 X4 platform’s integration with HomeKit.
Simmons comments confirm what Snap One told CE Pro during a booth visit at CEDIA Expo 2024—that Apple remains extremely popular among CEDIA market customers, and users want their personal devices to work seamlessly with their smart home devices.
“These are some of the number one things that we heard from integrators that they needed,” Simmons continues. “X4 delivers a lot of those things that people have been clamoring for.”
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