At its “Welcome Home” experience today, Apple announced the HomeView, a new smart home hub meant to serve as the command center for other connected smart home devices, including smart doorbells, smart lights, smart thermostats, and more.
The $299 HomeView, launching on November 13, has a 7-inch Liquid Retina touchscreen and is powered by Siri AI. It supports major smart home protocols, including Matter and Thread, for the widest compatibility with existing smart home devices. There are two versions of the HomeView: one with a built-in speaker in its base that resembles an old iMac G4, and one without it for mounting to walls. The one designed for countertops will be available in four colors: silver, starlight, rose pink, and space grey. The wall-mountable HomeView will only come in silver and space gray. Wall mounts are available in three configurations: the Power Mount USB-C Wall Connector ($59), the Power Mount AC Wired ($79), and the Power Mount PoE Wired ($129).
Both models also have a FaceTime camera on the front for video. Multiple HomeViews can also be used like an intercom.
Like many smart home hubs or smart displays made by other brands, the HomeView can display the temperature, show upcoming calendar events, and provide touchscreen controls for accessing connected smart home devices. The screen can be used to view security camera or video doorbell footage.
To help kickstart this smart home reboot, Apple is partnering with LG to sell a “Apple Home Collection” of smart home devices that it helped design, including a smart doorbell, a smart lock, smart indoor and outdoor security cameras, and a smart thermostat. Apple’s big sell with the HomeView is—like all of its other devices—privacy. With Apple Intelligence, you can get auto-generated video descriptions from video footage captured from supported Home devices. Previously, the feature required an iPhone that supported Apple Intelligence, but now you only need the HomeView and a subscription to a 2TB iCloud+ plan.
The coolest feature may be the HomeView’s built-in sensors that allow it to recognize different family members and switch accounts to only show that person’s information, like their calendar, notes, messages, reminders, photos, and more.
Pre-orders for the HomeView start today, and it’ll be available on November 13.
I’m at Apple’s “Welcome home” experience this morning. Stay tuned for my hands-on with the device on Gizmodo shortly.
