Apple HomeView Arrives on Counters and Walls as a Screen That Recognizes Who Walks Up

Apple HomeView landed this morning as a dedicated screen meant to sit in a kitchen, on a nightstand, or fixed to a wall, handling music, video calls, and the controls for lights, locks, and cameras all at once. Both the tabletop version and the wall-mounted version cost $299, with pre-orders open today and units shipping on November 13 in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, and a handful of other countries.

A 7″ Liquid Retina display is the main attraction here, with True Tone and a display brightness that lowers all the way down to 0.3 nits, so it doesn’t light up a dark room at 2 a.m. The tabletop form joins the display to a speaker dome at the base via a stainless steel hinge, allowing the screen to swing back and forth, ideal for finding a comfortable viewing position. Inside the base, there are some serious speakers, including two full-range drivers, a down-firing woofer, and a handful of force-cancelling passive radiators that provide Spatial Audio for Apple Music, podcasts, and other content. Instead of a woofer and a base, the wall-mounted variant uses a couple of drivers that are specifically tuned for on-wall mounting.

The brain of this operation is an A18 processor, which handles the entire show with distinct Secure Enclaves to keep the camera and microphones isolated from everything else, ensuring that neither the software nor Apple can access the raw data. Face recognition identifies up to six people and switches the screen to a personal Home Screen with that user’s apps, widgets, Messages, Calendar, and Reminders while keeping private content locked away from everyone else. However, shared photo albums and music are fair game for the entire household. You can also see more details about what’s going on as you approach it, as the interface becomes more intricate as you get near, yet everything is easy to understand from across the room.



Customizing the interface is very simple, as there are numerous options available, such as a Photos view with a nice depth effect, a flowy animation that interacts as you move about, and even a Snoopy layout that changes with time and weather. You may also add a Home Modular layout for easy access to lighting and thermostats, as well as a Home Camera view that displays up to nine live streams at once.



Siri handles the voice portion of things, as it can really converse with you, pull information from your iPhone or iPad if Apple Intelligence is enabled, answer almost any question you ask it, and even pick up where a discussion ended on another device. Plus, everything happens on-device or in private, so your communication remains private. Siri also runs Intercom messages that reach other HomeView units, HomePods, iPhones, and Apple Watches, and it can turn a recipe from the web into step-by-step instructions with hands-free timers. FaceTime calls use Center Stage to keep people framed, and Handoff lets audio move from an iPhone straight onto the HomeView speakers or out to multiroom setups with HomePod and AirPlay devices.



Smart Home controls allow you to easily operate cameras, thermostats, locks, blinds, and lights with the palm of your hand, voice commands, or a simple tap on the screen. It is also compatible with all of your existing HomeKit and Matter accessories, and Apple is partnering with LG and Schneider Electric to introduce a new line of Home Collection cameras, thermostats, and locks. If you have an iCloud+ subscription, this device can even recognize people, dogs, parcels, and automobiles in your compatible camera feeds and create a helpful textual description to accompany the footage. To top it all off, the aluminum casing is produced from recyclable materials, the tabletop model comes in a variety of colors ranging from silver to rose pink, and the box is made of eco-friendly fiber. Schneider Home offers wall mounts starting about $60, and a PoE option will be available early next year.



Availability stops short of the European Union because the current Siri AI features are not offered there. Apple describes HomeView as a device the whole house can share that still feels personal to whoever stands in front of it, tying entertainment, calls, and home controls into one stationary screen that already knows the people who live with it.