Apple will launch HomeOS in 2025 and introduce smart screens
When most of the market has already forgotten about stationary, smart screens, Apple wants to bring them back into favor and introduce Apple HomeOS, fully integrated with Apple Intelligence.
But that already happened, you say
Smart speakers with a screen glued to them were a spectacular beginning of the smart home era and… a blind link in its evolution. Even if something caught on (like Google’s solutions), smart screens were rapidly becoming obsolete. At least against the background of the extreme dynamics of development of smartphones and tablets. Is it finally different now and does Apple’s smart screen make any sense? Definitely yes.
Today’s tablets are devices that no longer require replacement every 2 years, but rather every 5-6 years. And this is often more due to battery consumption than to lack of performance or new functions. The displays themselves have also come a long way, including ours a smart screen does not have to glow black like a burnt-out monitor, but can actually blend in with an elegant interior. Moreover, this approach can also be seen in the designs of televisions with elegant frames, which are used not only for watching news, but also for displaying art.
Smart home control and use of Apple Intelligence
According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, Apple is working on two smart displays, one of which each aims to bring Apple’s AI into homes. The first one, codenamed J595, is a product that has been talked about a lot in recent months. This is the more advanced of devices, with an iPad-like screen and a robotic arm. The latter would rotate the screen and track the user with the camera’s eye.
The second device, codenamed J490, is intended to be a cheaper smart display designed mainly for FaceTime calls and controlling smart home gadgets. While the variant with a robotic arm will cost over $1,000, Gurman believes that the J490 will be much more affordable.
HomeOS, a variation on tvOS
The new devices will be managed by a completely new HomeOS operating system, which will probably be derived directly from tvOS, currently used in Apple TV set-top boxes. A special feature is to be full integration with Apple Intelligence and local machine learning, which current Apple TV and HomePods do not yet have.
The cheaper of the devices, the J490 model, is according to other sources to be designed as a hub for everyday tasks, with applications such as Calendar, Notes and Home, and an interface tailored for quick control of your smart home. There is even a magnetic hook as an option, which would allow you to place the screen on a refrigerator or easily mount it on walls.
While Google’s smart screens have become obsolete a long time ago, Amazon offers products from the Echo Show series, which seem to closely match Apple’s “innovations”, at least in this cheaper version.
