After HomePod, comes the new Apple HomeView: this new iMac G4-shaped home hub packs a 7-inch smart display designed to combine entertainment, communication and smart home control into one, alongside Siri AI, and face recognition features to show personal content to the relevant user.
Apple HomeView
The tabletop Apple HomeView has an aluminum body with a 7-inch Liquid Retina display attached to a domed speaker base by a stainless steel hinge, which certainly reminds us of the classic iMac G4 – it comes in silver, starlight, rose pink and space grey, each with a matching cable colors. Automatic brightness ranges from 500 nits down to 0.3 nits, and True Tone adjusts the display to ambient light. The UI changes its information density based on the user’s distance too, showing simpler information from afar and more detail up close.
A separate wall-mounted model, available in space gray and silver, uses the same display and features, and attaches with three mounts from Schneider Home (which can be user-installed). Audio on the tabletop model comes from two full-range drivers in the display, a down-firing woofer and two passive radiators, with computational audio tuning loudness and bass. The wall-mounted version instead uses two custom drivers tuned for on-wall placement.
Apple HomeView recognizes up to six people, each with a personalized Home Screen – personal content is shown only when the user’s face is recognized and their paired iPhone or iPad is nearby and recently unlocked. Display faces include Photos, Flow and a Snoopy face, while the Home Modular face and Home Camera face (up to nine live feeds) support smart home control. Camera and microphone data is processed in Secure Exclaves on the A18 chipset, the same one found in the iPhone 16.
Siri AI offers broader world knowledge, conversational responses and onscreen awareness. With an Apple Intelligence-enabled iPhone or iPad, it can draw on personal context from Calendar, Messages and other apps. Conversations started on HomeView can continue in the Siri app across other Apple devices. Siri AI on HomeView is available in English in the US, Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand, Singapore, South Africa and the UK, and is in beta in HomeView software version 27.2.
HomeView supports FaceTime with Center Stage, Intercom, Apple Music with lyrics, Apple Podcasts, Apple TV and compatible third-party apps. It also offers recipe conversion with hands-free timers, Find My, Handoff from iPhone, and multiroom audio with HomePod and AirPlay speakers. For smart home use, it works with compatible cameras and a supported iCloud+ plan for recognition of people, pets, packages and vehicles, and can detect smoke and carbon monoxide alarm sounds. It also works with the new Apple Home Collection and Matter accessories.
Apple HomeView will not be available in Malaysia for the time being. It will however be sold in the neighboring Singapore, as well as South Africa, Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand, the UK and the US, with availability from 13 November 2026, at an MSRP of $299. It is also not available in the European Union because Siri AI is currently unavailable on iOS there, due to DMA-related legal disputes.
Pokdepinion: A smart display that knows who’s talking is neat, but Malaysia isn’t on the list yet.
