Will a new CEO realize Apple’s smart home potential?

It took Tim Cook years to launch Apple into major new hardware categories, such as the smartwatch. But John Ternus could start his tenure right away with an ambitious new project: smart home hardware.

All signs point to a strong lineup of new smart home devices coming potentially this fall, putting Apple back in the game in a category where it has been painfully slow to ship new devices.

With a hardware man at the helm in Ternus, the chances of Apple fully committing to the smart home feel far higher than under Cook. And while, according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, Ternus was reluctant to invest deeply in the smart home a decade ago — taking “some responsibility” for Apple falling behind in the category — today he’s reportedly “leading the charge on a trio of home products.”

Apple has ceded ground to competitors in smart home hardware for years. Amazon and Google have launched more than 40 smart speakers and smart displays over the last decade, compared to Apple’s three. However, in that time, Apple has built out a privacy-focused, locally controlled platform for third-party devices. Take-up was initially slow from manufacturers, but Apple’s investment in Matter has spurred significant growth over the last few years. Yet there’s still been a dearth of Apple Home hardware. If the rumors are true, that’s all about to change.

First up, there’s the “HomePad,” rumored to be a roughly 7-inch-square touchscreen smart display featuring facial recognition, FaceTime, presence sensing, and control of smart home devices like lights, locks, and cameras. There are reported to be two form factors, a wall-mounted version that can snap to a MagSafe mount and one with a HomePod Mini-style speaker base. A device like this could help unlock one of the struggles in the smart home — shared control. Everyone in the home can control it, and the home can similarly react to each individual in it, rather than being controlled by one person and their phone.

Then there are rumors of dedicated Apple Home smart home devices, including home security cameras, a video doorbell, and a standalone sensor. Featuring facial recognition and presence sensors, the cameras could feed into Apple Home and a smarter Siri to provide it with context as to who is at home, when, and where. This would be a crucial element in unlocking the benefits of AI in the smart home, aiming to create a more ambient experience than today’s command-and-control interface.

Privacy-focused cameras are the only way people will be comfortable with this kind of visual awareness, and Apple already has a solution here. Cameras connected to its HomeKit Secure Video service can be set to detect activity without allowing for streaming video or recording.

Physical sensors will also play a role; newer HomePods are equipped with UWB, and the rumored Apple Home sensor could feed into a home security system and be key to whole-home orchestration.

Then there’s the long-rumored home robot, a tabletop device with a display mounted on a robotic arm. While a home device, this product also fits into the broader AI story. Based on a paper published last year, Apple may be exploring imbuing it with a personality, creating a type of physical AI that provides companionship as well as utility. This shift is something we will certainly see more of in the smart home, and Apple could be a leader here.

On the software side, there’s a real need for unification and a focus on the AI use case in the home. A new homeOS that merges tvOS and HomePod software is long overdue, and could be the foundation of an AI-powered brain to run your smart home. This could be revealed at WWDC this June, setting the stage for Apple Home’s renaissance. The other relevant rumors include a new chip coming to a HomePod Mini 2 and a next-gen Apple TV, which could bring full support for the new voice assistant features, plus — crucially — the ability to process most commands locally.

Apple’s failure to innovate in smart home hardware may have been due to its low priority within the company. But now, several forces are converging. Matter, the smart home standard Apple helped develop, is finally bringing real interoperability to the platform. The cancellation of the Apple Car project reportedly freed up significant engineering resources for the Apple Home. And AI is poised to reshape the functionality of smart homes.

Of course, Siri is the obvious holdup here. The long-stalled generative AI revamp that should bring a smarter, more context-aware assistant to the home could be the glue that will hold the hardware together. But it seems it’s all hands on deck at Apple to work out this problem. Amazon’s Alexa Plus and Google’s Gemini for Home have shown the potential of LLM-powered smart-home voice assistants, even if the reality is still very messy. When a smarter Siri does arrive, expectations are high that Apple will follow its traditional playbook — entering late but brilliantly.

For Ternus, the challenge of the smart home now lies in the execution. With the pieces in place, Apple’s smart home could go from side project to a core priority at Cupertino. The question is whether the new CEO can assemble them. And if he can channel Apple’s internal quest for perfection, characterized by the Cook era, into a drive that can take this potentially game-changing product category to fruition. For a company that has spent a decade building a foundation, now is the moment to finally move in.