The HomePod is becoming cheaper. The Apple smart speaker, which went on sale last year, has just received its first official price cut. Apple is reducing the pricing of the device in not just US, but all the markets where HomePod is currently sold, including China where it was launched just over two months ago. Originally introduced at Apple’s developer conference in June 2017, the HomePod was delayed and finally released in February 2018. It is yet to be launched in several major Asian markets, including India, Japan, and Singapore.
As per the updated pricing on Apple’s website, the HomePod will now retail at $299 (roughly Rs. 20,500) in the United States. It was earlier available at $349 (roughly Rs. 24,000). Although over the past year, we have seen the price of HomePod go down to as much as $249 (roughly Rs. 17,000), but the discounts were always part of the retailer promotions. Among other countries, the HomePod will now sell at CAD 399 in Canada, EUR 329 in Germany, Spain, and France, CNY 2,299 in China, HKD 2,399 in Hong Kong, AUD 469 in Australia, and GBP 279 in UK. The revised pricing is now applicable in all the markets. The HomePod price cut was first spotted by 9to5Mac.
Apple HomePod sports a cylindrical body with a small touchscreen on top. The smart speaker features seven tweeters, a four-inch woofer, and seven microphones. It runs on Apple’s audioOS platform, which is based on iOS. The HomePod integrates Siri, which is used to control the device.
A competitor to Amazon’s Echo Series and Google’s Home smart speakers, HomePod hasn’t seen much uptake. According to Strategy Analytics’s latest global smart speaker report, the Apple HomePod accounted for just 4.1 percent of the global smart speaker shipments in Q2 2018. In comparison, Amazon grabbed 35.5 percent of the market share, followed by Google with 30 percent.