Hands-on with HomePod

Speaker that talks the talk

Using a HomePod is… well, so Apple. Like with the AirPods, simply hold your iPhone near the unit and it sends over your Apple ID, Apple Music preferences, and Wi-Fi logins. All this, and it sounds pretty good… as you’d expect at this price. Vocals are all very clear, with heavy bass. This thing is loud, too, with impressive sound quality at higher volume.

The controls are at the top. The volume + and – buttons light up when pressed, and the “glow” in the middle appears when the speaker is in use. The touch controls are fairly responsive, although it would be nice to have haptic feedback when you tap. Double-tapping to skip tracks or triple-tapping to skip back is fine.

Simply saying “Hey Siri” to the speaker will activate Siri — even if you’re listening to a song at high volume. That was impressive. You can ask Siri to turn down the music, play another playlist, or read a review of the album being played — but to us, the robotic voice reading out felt a bit weird.

As a smart home controller, it’s pretty comprehensive and picks up voices well. Saying “Good morning!” opened the “Morning Scene”, which turned on the lights, raised the blinds, and started the kettle boiling. All this requires serious investment in your smart home, though.

The HomePod is late to the game, but it does what it set out to do: offer a premium listening experience that combines very well with Siri. It’s more expensive than equivalent rivals, though, and lacks things like Bluetooth playback or the ability to interact with many services outside the Apple ecosystem, so it’s really for those who have a Mac, iPhone, and Apple Watch and want highclass sound to go with them.