Apple’s rollout of the HomePod has been a bit slow, where unlike its iPhones and iPads and Mac computers, the availability of the HomePod is still very much limited to a handful of countries. However, the company has been slowly expanding its availability and come 23rd of August, it seems that the HomePod will finally be making its way to Japan.
Pre-orders for the HomePod are now live where they are priced at 32,800 yen, which after conversion roughly puts it at around the same price as back in the US, where the HomePod is priced at $299. It is unclear why Apple is taking so long to make the HomePod available around the world, but it could be due to Siri where Apple probably needs to get it right for each country and for the varying accents and languages spoken.
So far reviews of the speaker have been mixed, where some praise the audio quality coming from them, while others don’t find it quite as useful compared to other smart speakers like the Amazon Echo or Google Assistant. There have also been some criticism regarding its asking price, where at $299 it isn’t quite as cheap compared to the competition.
There have been some rumors suggesting that Apple could actually be working on a “mini”/cheaper version of the HomePod, but to date the company has yet to officially announce anything.
Filed in . Read more about Connected Objects, HomePod, IoT (Internet of Things), Japan, Siri and Speakers. Source: 9to5mac