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After suffering a few delays back in 2017 which kept it from making its long-awaited debut in 2017, Apple’s highly-anticipated smart speaker the HomePod will hit store shelves beginning February 9th. Making good on a promise of delivering the smart speaker to the masses to “early 2018”. 

Finally.

With the HomePod, Apple aims to make their mark in the smart speaker market where they already lagging behind in. When the HomePod was first announced last summer it’s the biggest advantage it promised was superior sound but other smart speakers on the market from Google and Amazon already have the jump on them when it comes to that. One clear advantage the HomePod has over the competitors is the name Apple attached to it and of course Siri.Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing, Philip Spencer had this to say about Apple’s new toy:

“HomePod is a magical new music experience from Apple. It brings advanced audio technologies like beam-forming tweeters, a high-excursion woofer, and automatic spatial awareness, together with the entire Apple Music catalog and the latest Siri intelligence, in a simple, beautiful design that is so much fun to use. We’re so excited for people to get HomePod into their homes, apartments, and businesses to hear it for themselves. We think they will be blown away by the audio quality. The team has worked to give Siri a deeper knowledge of music so that you can ask to play virtually anything from your personal favorites to the latest chart-topping releases, simply by saying ‘Hey Siri.”

The HomePod is just under 7 inches tall, under the hood it will have years of Apple’s software and hardware innovation. The HomePod will be powered by Apple’s A8 chip, feature a larger woofer, seven beam-forming tweeters that will be placed around the HomePod’s body. Paired with HomeKi, the HomePod can control numerous functions around your homes such as turning on the lights, raising your shades, controlling the thermostat and other functions. The HomePod boasts easy pairing by just placing your iPhone next to the device.

The only drawback to the HomePod is that multi-room support will not be available upon launch. Apple promises that it will be available via a free software update sometime later this year. Pre-orders for the HomePod will begin this Friday for US, UK and Austrailia customers, January 26th and it will cost $349.

Does the HomePod sound like something your budding smart home needs? Let us know in the comments below.

Photo: Apple