As Apple struggles to contain costs in a difficult economic climate, the company has reportedly delayed the rumored HomePod with an integrated screen until 2024.
- What’s happening? Some of Apple’s 2023 projects, including the HomePod with a built-in screen, have reportedly been pushed back to 2024.
- Why care? Unfortunately, there are no new HomePods for you this year.
- What to do? Read the original Bloomberg article.
HomePod with a screen will appear in 2024
Apple is cutting costs across the company, including in R&D. In the latest edition of his Bloomberg Power On newsletter, reporter Mark Gurman learned that the Cupertino giant is “pulling all the levers”amid company-wide cost cuts, including postponing non-essential projects such as the rumored HomePod speaker with an integrated touchscreen.
Here is an excerpt from the report:
Some projects, including new home devices like the HomePod with a screen, have been delayed until at least next year. This allows Apple to direct its research and development budget to more pressing projects.
He doesn’t mention how the device can use the built-in display.
How HomePod with display can work
HomePod and HomePod mini have circular displays at the top with simple LED indicators (not true bitmap screens) that provide useful status information.
If we were to guess, we’d say that adding a touchscreen would increase the HomePod’s usefulness and turn the speaker into a fantastic smart home controller.
To be honest, we never expected HomePod with screen to arrive in 2023.
HomePods with screens, cameras and robotic arms
Respected Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo recently said that he expects an updated HomePod with a 7-inch display to be available in 2024. in the company’s smart home strategy,” Kuo said.
Now Gurman has confirmed this information with his sources.
To Gurman’s credit, he’s been saying for years that Apple has been developing new “HomePod”models with built-in displays and cameras, like Google’s Nest Hub and Amazon’s Echo Show speakers with displays. For example, in March 2021, he said that new speakers with screens and cameras were being developed in Apple Labs, but warned that a launch was not imminent.
The following month, Gurman published a report saying that Apple would combine a HomePod speaker with an iPad mounted on a robotic arm so that the device could follow the user around the room during video calls. And in April 2022, Gurman learned that the upcoming HomePod with a screen will combine HomePod and Apple TV features and feature a FaceTime camera.