Apple introduced Apple HomeView at its "Welcome home" event on October 13, 2026. It's Apple's first-ever smart display, something many have been waiting on for years amid long-running "HomePad" rumors — and the confirmed $299 price actually undercuts the $350 analyst Mark Gurman had previously floated.
The design is a 7-inch Liquid Retina display in an aluminum shell, connected to a domed speaker base by a stainless steel hinge that tilts smoothly for comfortable viewing at any table height. It comes in four colors — silver, starlight, rose pink and space gray — each with a matching charging cable. The wall-mounted version comes in just space gray and silver, attaching via hardware from Schneider Home, with self-install or professional install options.
The display adjusts brightness all the way from 500 nits down to just 0.3 nits — gentle enough for a nightstand — with True Tone adapting color to ambient light. It's also smart about distance: simpler info from across the room, richer detail as you step closer.
The headline feature is facial recognition for up to six household members, each getting their own personalized Home Screen and a choice of "Faces" themes, from real family photos to a minimal clock face. Personal content in Messages, FaceTime, Calendar, Reminders and Find My stays private to each person, while shared photo albums and playlists remain accessible to everyone in the house, guests included.
A new Siri AI, far more conversational
The big software story is Siri AI, an entirely new version powered by the next-gen Apple Intelligence and newer Apple silicon. It's more natural to talk to and answers a much wider range of questions thanks to broad world knowledge, even without a paired Apple Intelligence-enabled iPhone. Pair it with one and Siri AI can draw on personal context — your calendar, messages, playlists — for more relevant answers, and conversations you start on HomeView continue in the Siri app on iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch or Apple Vision Pro via iCloud.
FaceTime comes with Center Stage, automatically keeping you framed as you move around the room. The audio engineering isn't an afterthought either — two full-range drivers in the display, a down-firing woofer, and two force-cancelling passive radiators in the base for extra bass. Apple Music plays with animated album art and lyrics, Handoff works by placing an iPhone in front of the screen, and multiroom audio spans HomeView, HomePod, HomePod mini and AirPlay speakers.
For the smart home side, you can control cameras, thermostats, lights, locks and blinds by touch or voice. A Home Camera view can livestream up to nine video feeds at once, and with an active iCloud+ subscription you get end-to-end encrypted recognition of people, pets, packages and vehicles on top, plus alerts pushed to your iPhone, iPad or Apple Watch when it hears smoke or carbon monoxide alarms. In the kitchen, HomeView turns a recipe from the web into hands-free, step-by-step cooking guidance with built-in timers.
This is where it connects to "Apple Home Collection," the lineup we originally expected to be the headline story here — in the actual press release, Apple only mentions it briefly as a collection of cameras, thermostats and a lock made with LG Electronics and Schneider Electric that works with HomeView, shipping from December 2026 with some pieces stretching into early 2027. No product names, prices or real images were given in this release; pricing reported earlier by outside tech press came from secondhand coverage, not Apple directly, and still needs Apple's own confirmation.
On security, Apple is leaning hard on something it calls Secure Exclaves — a protected, compartmentalized area in the A18 chip that processes camera/microphone data separately, inaccessible to other software, apps, the user, or even Apple itself. Personal content only surfaces when a face is recognized and the paired iPhone/iPad is nearby and has been recently unlocked.
Pricing and add-ons: both the tabletop and wall-mounted models cost $299 USD. Wall-mounting requires separately purchased hardware from Schneider Home — a USB-C wall connector starting at $59.95, an AC wired version at $79.95, and a PoE (power-over-ethernet) version coming early 2027 at $129.95.
So when does Thailand get it? Bluntly — it's not on the pre-order country list at all right now (only Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand, Singapore, the UK, the US, and South Africa via authorized resellers). Siri AI also launches in English only, with no Thai language support yet. If you want one now, you're looking at waiting for a market expansion or having someone bring one in from abroad, handling warranty and import duties yourself.
For context against existing smart displays like Amazon Echo Show or Google Nest Hub, neither of which is officially sold in Thailand either, HomeView isn't breaking new ground in being hard for Thai buyers to get. But it is Apple's first serious entry into the smart display category, which makes it worth watching for when that expansion reaches Southeast Asia. Information based on Apple's official announcement, October 13, 2026. Pricing and availability may change; please check with Apple before purchasing.
