Apple has announced a lot of new stuff at the WWDC today, including a smart home speaker known as HomePod. The company has finally unveiled its product for competing with Amazon Echo and Google Home.
The new smart speaker comes with a seven-speaker array of tweeters along with a four-inch upward facing subwoofer. An Apple A8 chip powers it. Apple has designed it in a way that the speaker adjusts to its surroundings, which is known as “spatial awareness,” that lets the speaker tune the sound according to space. It has advanced echo cancellation that allows Siri to understand if people are standing near the device or across the room. It adjusts the volume accordingly.
HomePod is compatible with Apple Music and can easily access full playlist on the app. It comes integrated with a six-microphone array, which is used to access Siri, seamlessly. Users will be able to ask Siri music related questions such as “Who’s playing guitar on this track?” or “What was the top song on June 5th, 2016?” Not just these questions, Siri can answer questions related to unit conversion, news, traffic, sports, weather, reminders, timers, and more. Siri waveform will display on the top of HomePod to indicate if it is engaged.
Also, HomePod is also compatible with Apple services like iMessage and HomeKit. The smart speakers will let a user control smart home products even when they are not at home. HomePod will retail at $349 when it starts shipping in December in the UK, US, and Australia.
