Apple’s new HomeView device doesn’t have an App Store, but it does have an app story, of a sort. There are some selected Apple apps on its (surprisingly) iPad-like home screen, but you can’t add more. What’s a person to do?

If you use apps that play audio or video and support CarPlay, though, you’re in luck: HomeView supports those apps, and just those apps, via projection from your iPhone. So if you’re a fan of Overcast or Spotify, you’re in luck.

And if you’re curious about video CarPlay, well, that’s a feature Apple added this year that lets apps play video using CarPlay when the car is parked. And the HomeView is always parked.

Beyond that, though, it seems like HomeView is at least starting life as a very limited app platform. Apple does say that if you make a Siri AI query for your personal content, it will search everything on your iPhone or iPad—and that includes apps that aren’t on the HomeView. So you should be able to query your iPhone apps, but not actually run them.

In the short term, this means that if you want to (for example) access your calendar right on your device, you will probably have to do so via Apple’s Calendar app, even if you use a different app on your other devices. (If you use an app that has a web app equivalent, you could probably open it up in Safari, which is an app that the HomeView does offer.)

In the long term, I still think it’s quite likely that Apple will eventually expand what can be run on HomeView. I haven’t used one yet, but based on what I’ve seen on Apple’s website, it feels very much like a 1.0 product with plenty of room for expansion. Whether that comes in the form of apps, widgets, or access for CarPlay apps that aren’t audio or video apps, remains to be seen.

On Tuesday as a part of its deluge of smart home announcements, Apple has launched something a bit different: a series of products called Apple Home Collection that are… not quite Apple products, but not not Apple products. Instead, they’re “designed in collaboration” with partners, in this case LG Electronics and Schneider Electric.

It’s hard to tell where one company ends and the other begins, but if you carry the weight of a brand like Apple, having Apple stand over the shoulder of some other company and sprinkle in some secret ingredients isn’t the worst approach if you don’t want to actually build and support those products yourself.

According to Apple, each accessory can be set up with one tap from an iPhone, and only requires the Apple Home app. (That describes a lot of products today, too—it’ll be interesting to see if Apple’s added some new tech just for these products or if they’re largely using standard techniques that other products in the market can offer.)

Now to the products, which will be available starting in December, and all of which share a “clean, minimal aesthetic and premium materials,” which would probably be your first clue that Apple was involved in their design.

LG is offering four cameras, all of which capture 2.5K video and connect directly with iCloud for video via the HomeKit Secure Video specification.¹ There’s a video doorbell (with chime integrated with HomeView, HomePod, and HomePod mini), a combination camera and floodlight, a standard outdoor camera, and an indoor camera that can tilt down automatically to physically stop monitoring when a family member enters the home.

Apple gets in the smart lock game with LG’s Smart Deadbolt Lock, which uses UWB for automatic unlocking when you approach the door, like the locks released earlier this year by Aqara and Schlage. It’s also got NFC support for non-UWB devices, a numeric keypad, and a hidden physical key slot.

And then there are the smart thermostats. There are two of these, from LG and Schneider Electric. The two thermostats support external temperature and humidity sensors as well as those built in to HomeView, HomePod, and HomePod mini. It’s unclear what differences the two products have, but Apple’s press release hints that there might be some different kinds of system compatibility, perhaps for the home heating and cooling systems themselves, though both are described as working “with a broad range of HVAC systems.”

Every one of the accessories supports Thread, which Apple has been building into its devices for a while now. While it doesn’t seem like there’s much here that hasn’t been done in other smart home products, Apple’s stamp of approval is important. If you don’t do a lot of research, even today you can end up buying a smart home product that has hidden gotchas. These devices will presumably be as standard and Apple-friendly as they come.

That said, other smart home products also seem to live up to everything Apple is describing with the Home Collection. Until these products ship, it will be hard to determine if there’s some special stuff Apple is doing with these products that’s unavailable to other products, but at a glance it doesn’t seem so.

Among its smart home product announcements on Tuesday, Apple announced the new HomePod mini 2, priced at $149 and powered by an S10 chip (introduced in the Apple Watch Series 10). Curiously, its banner feature—support for Siri AI—will not be available when the product ships on October 30.

According to Apple, Siri AI will come to the HomePod mini 2 “in a future software update.” When it does, Apple’s press release hints that it will be able to tap into personal context when paired with an Apple Intelligence-capable iPhone or iPad. When there’s no such device available, it’ll still have access to broader Siri AI functionality, but won’t have access to the treasure trove of data that rides with your device.

Of course, since home accessories are the order of the day, Apple has touted the HomePod mini 2’s integration with the broader home experience. Like its predecessor, you can use it to control home devices via voice commands. Apple’s also supporting a new four-speaker surround sound setup, when four HomePod minis are connected to the new Apple TV 4K.

Apple also continues to tinker with that little glowing circle at the top of the HomePod, that’s not quite a display but is… something. The new Sound Glow feature turns it into a visualizer that is based on the sound of the currently playing song, and its color scheme will match the song’s associated album art.

As was widely expected, Apple today took the wraps off its “HomePod with a screen”, dubbed the HomeView.

The device features a seven-inch Liquid Retina display with multitouch, at 1088-by-1088 resolution and is powered by an A18 chip. It comes in two different styles: a model intended to sit on a tabletop with a half-dome and small tilt-adjustable arm holding up the display, and one that’s meant to be wall-mounted. The former comes in silver, starlight, rose pink, and space gray options, while the latter has only silver and space gray.

The other main distinction between the two is the addition of more speakers on the tabletop version: a custom down-firing woofer and dual force-cancelling passive radiators. Both, however, nominally support spatial audio with Dolby Atmos. If you opt for the wall-mounted version, you can pick up a wall mount sold separately.

That A18 chip gives the HomeView enough juice to run Siri AI, which is at the heart of the new experience. The HomeView comes with a subset of built-in apps familiar from Apple’s devices, including Calendar, Home, Safari, Music, Messages, Podcasts, Weather, FaceTime, and more. Additional apps can be powered by a connected iPhone, including Apple News and Apple TV, as well as “supported third-party audio and video apps.” Apple says the device will recognize up to six people and gives them each their own home screen, while still allowing some shared features amongst all members of a household, such as music or shared photo albums. A 12MP Center Stage camera allows for FaceTime calls.

In terms of interface, the HomeView is reminiscent of the Apple Watch, with a customizable clock screen and various “faces”, including a Home Modular face that provides access to your commonly used smart home devices.

Apple also showed off a recipe specific mode that can detect recipes in Safari and format them appropriately for the device.

Both versions of the HomeView cost $299 and will be available on November 13. Pre-orders are open today for customers in Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand, the UK, and the U.S. The device is not available in the European Union, due to the lack of Siri AI in that region.

Mark Gurman has last-minute Apple product details in his Sunday newsletter:

The centerpiece is a new smart home hub called the HomeView. Equipped with a display and an A18 chip, the product essentially serves as the Siri command center for an Apple-powered household…

The HomeView comes in two versions: a countertop model with a metal speaker base and a wall-mounted version with a flat, square base that sits against the wall beneath the display. The countertop offering will come in four colors: space gray, silver, starlight and pink, while the wall-mounted version will be limited to space gray and silver.

The name dovetails with a MacRumors report that Apple used a shell company to trademark “HomeView” last year. So much for my prediction of a re-use of the base HomePod name.

Gurman also says the new Apple TV remote will have a speaker, and the new Apple TV itself will have a microphone to enable it to receive Siri requests directly.

Go to the linked site.

Read on Six Colors.

The announcement that Apple’s making a home-related announcement on Tuesday was hardly unexpected. Most things Apple does these days are reported in advance, usually by Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman.

But this event has been years in the making. Gurman first reported in detail on the centerpiece product two years ago:

Apple… is nearing the launch of a new product category: a wall-mounted display that can control appliances, handle videoconferencing and use AI to navigate apps…. The company is gearing up to announce the device as early as March and will position it as a command center for the home, according to people with knowledge of the effort. The product, code-named J490, also will spotlight the new Apple Intelligence AI platform, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the work is confidential.

J490 did not, in fact, ship in March of 2025. The failed Apple Intelligence roll-out meant that the company had to push back the release of its AI-powered home products until after it could fix its AI issues and launch Siri AI last month.

It’s been a long time coming. Apple has made some runs at addressing the smart-home market in the past, but it’s never seemed to be part of a coherent, consistent strategy. (Many of us still can’t forgive it for abandoning the AirPort product line just as the advent of mesh networking would have provided the company opportunities that ended up accruing to companies like Eero, now a part of Amazon.)

Perhaps in new CEO John Ternus, Apple really does have a powerful internal advocate for the smart home. In a funny twist of fate, Apple’s intransigence in this category hasn’t really harmed its chances. Amazon and Google have been selling products similar to J490—touchscreen voice assistant home hubs—for years now, but they have failed to catch fire. I’ve used multiple Echo Shows and Google Nest Hubs in my kitchen over the years, and they have all been various degrees of terrible.

More broadly, the entire smart home market has suffered from fragmentation and mediocrity. Early devices were expensive, unreliable, and impractical. Things have gradually improved, and the tech giants have reached a detente that has made everything more interoperable. But even so, it’s really only this year that (for example) I feel like the smart lock has reached a level of tech capability that allows it to fulfill its promise, thanks to UWB support.

So is there a universe in which Apple rolls into this category at this late date and actually finds success where others have struggled to get traction? I’m not saying it’s a likely scenario, but it’s certainly possible. Apple’s track record with prioritizing user security and privacy is certainly an asset for anyone considering adding tech devices (especially ones with sensors) to their personal spaces. Apple’s tight device integration could also be a strong selling point for the many users who are fully bought in to the ecosystem.

So I’m saying there’s a chance.

The future of home is widgets?

The more I think about J490 or the HomePad or whatever it will ultimately be called—my money’s still on something with the HomePod name, possibly even just HomePod—the more I feel like it will expose Apple’s current thinking about the role of apps on its platforms. (Kind of an important topic.)

The wild success of the iOS App Store starting in 2009 transformed how Apple viewed the role of software in its operating system. Handed a big hammer, Apple saw nails everywhere. The Mac got an App Store, which exists, but I think nobody would consider a hit. The Apple Watch got an App Store, which also exists but seems kind of pointless. Messages got an App Store, which also exists, much to my surprise. And of course, tvOS was revamped under the premise that “the future of TV is apps,” but that future never really arrived.

Perhaps Apple has taken notice that the everything-has-an-App-Store strategy is really showing diminishing returns. The problem is, what do you do with a device like this forthcoming touchscreen? It doesn’t run iOS or tvOS, but apparently yet another variant of Apple’s omni-OS foundation. If it supports playing video from Apple TV but not Netflix, or podcasts from Apple Podcasts but not Overcast, or music from Apple Music but not Spotify, that’ll be frustrating. And the strength of the iPhone app ecosystem is one of Apple’s greatest assets.

So what’s Apple to do? My best guess is that it’s going to use some technology we’ve already seen to let your apps peek through on this new device from your iPhone. macOS Sequoia introduced the ability to display widgets and receive notifications directly from your iPhone—a feature that, given the timing, might actually have been invented for this as-yet-unreleased device!

In the long run, I wonder if the answer on devices that are ancillary to the iPhone—and I’ll throw the Apple Watch in here, too, since it already does this—is to allow app developers to include apps for alternate Apple platforms along with their existing App Store apps. You don’t actually need to use the watchOS App Store to download Apple Watch apps—you just get the iPhone app and your iPhone installs the app on your watch. If Apple wants real apps running on its smart home devices, perhaps they just transfer over from your iPhone.

In the meantime, projecting widgets doesn’t seem like a bad compromise to make the home hub more personal without requiring yet another App Store and all that complexity.

Of course, the next problem this product will face is that, as a device that sits in a home, it is probably going to need to interact with more than a single user. Beyond the Mac, Apple has struggled with the concept of multiple people using a single device. You can do it on Apple TV, but it’s not a great experience. You can do it, sort of, on HomePods. But if Apple is going to tie in the contents of a user’s iPhone with this home hub, it needs the device to be able to shift context on the fly and display content from a particular person’s iPhone, or (in the case of children or guests) someone without a paired iPhone at all.

Tricky stuff, and not a place where Apple has a great track record. Gurman’s reports suggest Apple is going to try a form of face recognition (that’s sub-Face ID level, but that’s probably okay for something found inside a home) in order to determine the context of which person is interacting with the device. We’ll see how it goes, and how responsive it can be if it’s got to connect to an iPhone and display widgets or load other personal data.

The Siri AI question

Then there’s the feature that has made these products all wait for their moment in the sun: Apple Intelligence. Apple has been slow to roll out iOS 27, probably to limit a surge of use of Siri AI on Apple’s servers. Numerous people have reported that Siri AI feels a little slower now than it did this summer, when the user base was smaller.

These products—not just the home hub, but next-generation HomePod mini speakers—will live or die with the functionality of Apple’s voice assistant. I’ve found Siri AI to be a pleasant surprise, an entirely functional voice assistant that replaced an entirely dysfunctional one. But if it fails me on my iPhone or iPad, I can just do things myself. That’s a lot less true on a device that’s meant to use voice as its primary interaction mode. Apple needs to get this right.

The rest of the story

Finally, there’s the question of how Apple will approach the entire smart home ecosystem. What product categories are worthy of Apple’s own brand name, and what ones can be served by preferred partners?

Gurman’s report this week that Apple is working with LG to build a smart lock and a series of security cameras, starts to answer that question. At least for now, it seems that Apple is going to approach this with three tiers: a few Apple-built products (home hub, speakers, TV box), some “second-party” products built in collaboration with Apple but released by LG and possibly others (cameras, lock), and presumably other Matter and Apple Home certified products that will receive Apple’s attention, promotion, and Apple Store placement.

I do wonder how Apple will make its decisions about what products it will decide to build itself. Will it go this far, but no further? Or do its LG collaborations give it time to figure out what categories could use a little bit of Apple magic? (Once again, I am imploring Apple to consider bringing back AirPort.)

That said, I’ve got a couple of Aqara 4K security cameras that work great, and the Aqara and Schlage UWB locks are pretty great. Apple doesn’t need to build products in new categories if other companies are making products that meet Apple’s standards. And maybe it’s hoping that its own moves here will set a direction and encourage further investment, so Apple doesn’t have to do everything itself.

After years of Apple never engaging with the smart home category for very long, this is an opportunity for a reset. What Apple announces on Tuesday will be a good start, but we’ve seen good starts from Apple before. It needs to keep its eye on the category, keep shipping new products, and continually improve its home software. If this is just a short-term lease, it’ll be pointless. Apple needs to get a mortgage and settle into its new home.

A Apple parece estar preparando seus sistemas para a nova leva de produtos que será lançada em breve. A menos de 24 horas do evento “Surprise and shine” (“Surpreendente e brilhante”), a empresa adicionou nada menos que 37 novos identificadores de hardware ao seu backend, abrangendo iPhones, iPads, Macs, Apple Watches e outros dispositivos.

A descoberta foi feita por Aaron Perris. No X, ele compartilhou todos os identificadores, sendo sete deles relacionados a iPhones.

A bunch of upcoming Apple device identifiers have been found on Apple’s backend. Interestingly, there are 7 iPhone models listed. We only know of 6.

iPhone19,1
iPhone19,2
iPhone19,3
iPhone19,4
iPhone19,5
iPhone19,6
iPhone19,7

Mac17,10
Mac17,11
Mac17,12
Mac17,13
Mac18,1
Mac18,2…

— Aaron (@aaronp613) September 8, 2026

O número chama atenção pois, até o momento, os rumores dão conta de seis modelos compondo a futura linha: “iPhone 18 Pro”, “iPhone 18 Pro Max” e “iPhone Ultra”, além dos “iPhone 18”, “iPhone Air 2” e “iPhone 18e” — os três últimos, segundo as notícias, só serão lançados no ano que vem.

Isso, porém, não significa necessariamente que a Apple esteja preparando um sétimo iPhone do qual nunca ouvimos falar. O identificador pode muito bem ser simplesmente uma variante de um dos modelos já esperados — como, por exemplo, uma configuração específica do “iPhone Ultra” destinada à China.

Além dos iPhones, a lista inclui nove identificadores de Macs, oito de iPads, nove de Apple Watches, um de Apple TV e três associados à categoria “HomeAccessory”, utilizada internamente pela Apple para produtos domésticos.

Lembrando que, no evento de amanhã, a Apple muito provavelmente lançará produtos como o “Apple Watch Series 12”, o “Apple Watch Ultra 4”, uma nova geração da Apple TV e, quem sabe, o aguardado hub inteligente para a casa — além dos iPhones, é claro. Novos Macs (como um iMac com chip M6 e a estreia dos “MacBooks Ultra”) e iPads (como o iPad mini com tela OLED), contudo, não são esperados para esta semana.

Alguém ansioso por aqui?! 😬

via 9to5Mac

HomePod room temperature automations turn Apple’s smart speaker into more than a source of music and Siri responses. Its built-in climate sensor can trigger fans, thermostats, smart plugs, shades and other compatible accessories when a room becomes warmer or cooler than a selected temperature.

The automation runs through Apple’s Home app. Once configured, it does not require someone to ask Siri for the current reading or leave an iPhone inside the room. HomePod measures the local conditions while the home hub evaluates the rule and controls the selected accessories.

A bedroom fan could start when the room rises above 24°C, for example. A compatible thermostat could activate heating when an office falls below 18°C, while motorized shades could close before afternoon heat makes a living room uncomfortable.

The same system works with humidity. HomePod can trigger a compatible humidifier, dehumidifier or ventilation accessory when relative humidity crosses a chosen level.

Which HomePod Models Measure Room Temperature

Temperature and humidity sensing is available on HomePod mini and HomePod (2nd generation).

The original full-size HomePod does not contain the supported climate sensor. It can act as a home hub and participate in scenes, but it cannot supply the temperature reading used to start this type of automation.

HomePod mini is sometimes overlooked because Apple did not activate its temperature and humidity sensor when the speaker originally launched in 2020. A later software update enabled the component, allowing existing HomePod mini units to report climate information without a hardware upgrade.

Both supported models should run the latest available HomePod software. The iPhone or iPad used to configure the home should also be updated because older software may not display every sensor or automation option correctly.

HomePod normally updates automatically. Its version can be checked in the Home app by opening the HomePod, selecting its settings and scrolling to the software information.

The Speaker Must Be Assigned to the Correct Room

The room assigned to HomePod determines how its readings appear in the Home app and how Siri interprets questions about local conditions.

A HomePod physically located in the bedroom but assigned to Living Room will report its sensor as part of the living-room climate group. This becomes especially confusing when several HomePods are installed throughout the home.

To verify the room, open the Home app, touch and hold the HomePod tile, open Accessory Settings and check the Room field. Assign a descriptive name to the HomePod as well, particularly when two supported speakers occupy nearby spaces.

The sensor does not measure an entire home. It reports conditions near the HomePod, so the assigned room should correspond to its physical location.

How to Check the HomePod Temperature

The current reading is available through Siri or the Home app.

A person can ask Siri, “What is the temperature in here?” when speaking to the HomePod inside that room. Questions can also identify a different room, such as “What is the temperature in the bedroom?” or “What is the humidity in the basement?”

In the Home app, open the Home tab and select Climate near the top of the screen. Choose Temperature to see readings from available climate sensors. Opening an individual room can make it easier to identify the relevant HomePod when several sensors are installed.

The Home app may display a range rather than one number when multiple temperature sensors belong to the same room or home. Opening the temperature category reveals the individual readings behind that range.

A newly restarted or updated HomePod may not show a result immediately. Apple says the sensor requires time to calibrate after startup.

How to Create a HomePod Room Temperature Automation

The temperature sensor appears as an automation trigger rather than an accessory that can be turned on or off. The user defines a threshold and then selects what another compatible accessory should do when the reading crosses it.

To create the automation:

1. Open the Home app on an iPhone or iPad
2. Select the Automation tab or tap the Add button and choose Add Automation
3. Choose A Sensor Detects Something
4. Select the temperature sensor assigned to the appropriate HomePod and room
5. Choose Rises Above or Drops Below
6. Set the desired temperature threshold
7. Add optional time and occupancy conditions
8. Select the accessories or scene that should run
9. Configure the desired state of each accessory
10. Test the automation and tap Done

The selected action could turn on a fan, change a compatible thermostat, close shades or activate an existing scene containing several accessories.

HomePod does not produce cool or warm air itself. It supplies the measurement and functions as a home hub, while the automation controls other equipment connected to Apple Home.

Choosing Rises Above or Drops Below

The direction of the trigger is important.

Rises Above starts the automation when the measured temperature moves from below the selected value to above it. This is the usual option for starting a fan, lowering compatible shades or changing a thermostat to a cooler setting.

Drops Below works in the opposite direction. It can start heating, turn off a fan or activate another accessory when the room becomes colder than the selected level.

These are threshold-crossing events, not continuous questions asking whether the room is currently above or below a value. If the room is already warmer than 24°C when a new Rises Above 24°C automation is saved, the rule may not run immediately. The reading generally needs to fall below the threshold and then rise across it again.

This behavior also explains why an automation may not repeatedly react while the room remains on the same side of the threshold. Another transition must occur before the trigger fires again.

Use Time and Occupancy Conditions

The Home app can restrict a temperature automation to particular times or household conditions.

A bedroom fan may only need to run overnight. Heating in a home office could remain inactive on weekends. A cooling automation might operate only when someone is home, while another rule protects temperature-sensitive equipment regardless of occupancy.

The People condition can limit an automation to when somebody is home, when nobody is home or when selected household members are present or absent. These conditions depend on location access and the devices associated with members of the Apple Home.

Time restrictions should match the behavior of the controlled accessory. Closing shades during the hottest afternoon hours may be useful, but the same action would provide little benefit after sunset.

An automation can also activate a scene instead of controlling one product. A Hot Afternoon scene could close the west-facing shades, start a fan and turn off heat-producing decorative lights with one sensor trigger.

Useful HomePod Temperature Automations

A smart fan is one of the simplest accessories to control. When the temperature rises above a comfortable level, the Home app can turn on a HomeKit or Matter-compatible fan. A second automation can stop it after the room cools.

A thermostat offers more direct climate control, but the available actions depend on the thermostat manufacturer. Apple Home may expose power, heating, cooling and target-temperature controls, while more advanced scheduling remains inside the manufacturer’s app.

Motorized shades can reduce solar heating before an air conditioner needs to work harder. A temperature trigger can close selected shades when a sun-facing room becomes warm, particularly when the automation is limited to daytime hours.

A ceiling fan or portable fan connected through a smart switch or smart plug can also respond to the HomePod sensor. The connected controller must be rated for the appliance, and the appliance must safely resume operation when power is restored. Products with electronic controls may remain off after a smart plug turns them back on.

Portable heaters and air conditioners require greater caution. Many smart plugs are not designed for their electrical load, and some appliance manufacturers prohibit external switching. A compatible thermostat or manufacturer-supported controller is safer than treating high-power climate equipment like a lamp.

Humidity Can Use the Same Automation System

HomePod exposes temperature and relative humidity as separate sensors.

A bathroom or laundry-room HomePod could trigger ventilation when humidity rises above a chosen level. A dehumidifier with a compatible control could operate in a damp basement, while a humidifier could respond when heated winter air becomes too dry.

The setup process is almost identical to a temperature automation. Select A Sensor Detects Something, choose the HomePod’s humidity sensor, set Rises Above or Drops Below and assign the action.

Humidity automations also benefit from separate starting and stopping thresholds. Turning a dehumidifier on above 65 percent and off below 55 percent creates a useful operating range instead of responding repeatedly around one value.

HomePod Sensor Placement Affects the Reading

HomePod measures the conditions around the speaker, not at the center of the room or inside an air-conditioning return.

Placing it beside a sunny window, heater, fireplace, kitchen appliance or air vent can produce readings that do not represent the space where people spend time. An enclosed shelf may also trap warmer air around the device.

The speaker needs airflow and a stable surface. It should not be covered or placed where condensation, cooking steam or direct moisture can reach it.

Extended audio playback at high volume can reduce sensor accuracy because heat generated by the speaker may influence the local reading. This matters when an automation uses a narrow threshold and the HomePod frequently plays loud music.

Apple says temperature sensing is optimized for indoor domestic environments between approximately 15°C and 30°C. Humidity sensing is optimized between about 30 and 70 percent relative humidity. Readings outside those ranges may be less accurate.

HomePod is therefore useful for comfort-oriented home automation, but it should not replace specialized monitoring required for medicine, food storage, animals, greenhouses or other temperature-sensitive environments.

Why a Temperature Automation May Not Work

Begin by confirming that the temperature reading itself appears in the Home app. If it is missing, verify the HomePod model, install current software and allow time for calibration after restarting.

Check that the correct temperature sensor was selected. Homes containing multiple HomePods may present several sensors with similar names, particularly when the speakers were never given descriptive room assignments.

Open the automation and confirm that it is enabled. Review its time and People conditions, because a functioning temperature trigger will still do nothing when an additional condition is not satisfied.

Use the Test This Automation control to confirm that the destination accessory responds. If the test fails, the problem is more likely to involve the accessory, its network connection or the selected action than the HomePod sensor.

If the test succeeds but the rule does not run naturally, remember that the temperature must cross the threshold in the selected direction. Temporarily choosing a value closer to the current room temperature can make testing easier.

Home hubs and accessories should remain connected to the same Apple Home. Thread-based accessories also need a supported Thread-enabled home hub or border router, such as HomePod mini, HomePod (2nd generation) or a compatible Apple TV 4K.

Build Two Automations for Stable Climate Control

A single automation can start a device but may not provide the best way to stop it.

Using the same threshold in opposite directions can cause frequent switching when the measured temperature fluctuates around that value. A room hovering near 24°C, for example, could repeatedly move just above and below the boundary.

A more stable arrangement uses two thresholds. One automation turns the fan on when the temperature rises above 24°C. A separate automation turns it off when the temperature drops below 22°C.

The gap creates a controlled operating range. Once the fan starts, it can continue working until the room has cooled meaningfully rather than stopping after a minor change.

Heating can follow the reverse pattern. One automation activates heat below 18°C, while another stops it above 20°C. Humidifiers and dehumidifiers can use the same paired-rule structure.

This separation also makes troubleshooting easier because every automation performs one clear action in response to one specific sensor transition. Instead of asking one complicated rule to manage the complete climate cycle, HomePod supplies the measurements while two predictable Home app automations define when the connected equipment starts and stops.

The post HomePod Room Temperature Automations in the Home App appeared first on AppleMagazine.

I had a simple task that involved Apple Home. If you use Apple Home, you know what happened next. Tears, frustration, the arrival of batteries, paperclips pushed into hard-to-reach holes, many online searches, and—if you are lucky, as I was—success.

Siri, am I lazy?

My goal was straightforward: can I know if the garage door is open without going to look? Early in the pandemic, we occasionally forgot to close it. While there was a locked door between the garage and the house, it still felt like we were playing with fire, as someone could steal a bike or other lesser goodies from the garage.¹ The garage is on our basement floor (ground level on one half of the house), and the last thing I enjoy doing at night is walking downstairs before bed to check the door.²

I purchased an Eve Door & Window Contact Sensor to have this capability reported by Apple Home, joining a growing set of HomeKit devices, including our front-door deadbolt. Because of our old-style single-piece swing-up garage door, I had a heck of a time finding the right place and right adhesive to stick the sensor where it was close enough for the two components to register.

I spent enough time on the vagaries of physics and materials that I was probably more frustrated than I needed to be when I tried to make a workflow with the danged thing. An Automation wouldn’t work because I wanted an alert, not for the sensor to trigger other Home devices. A Shortcut should have worked, but after many hours of trying over weeks, I was unable to get anything reliable to happen. The Automation was quite simple: at 9 p.m., check the state of the sensor, and send me a message if the sensor shows Open rather than Closed. I left it in place and walked away for literally years.

After recently installing a back-driveway camera, I was determined to get this sensor online.³ First, I replaced the battery, which had died during my period of disinterest. The Eve sensor uses a weird, tiny battery: a 3.6V 1/2 AA (ER14250). After that arrived, using some better adhesive—thin-film 3M 468MP—I positioned the sensor pieces in a better location and more securely.

Now it should work! Except that after adding it, I saw Characteristic in red text on a pink background in Shortcuts. Some online research led me to reset the sensor by inserting a paperclip into a hole I hadn’t noticed. After re-pairing the sensor, I was in business! Or was I?! The sensor wasn’t responding, despite recent status updates.

Threading the sensor through the house needle

This led me to the next culprit: the garage is too far away (one floor and the other end of the house) from my Apple TV, which acts as a Matter controller, while the Eve sensor relies on Thread as its communication protocol. What’s a Matter controller?⁴ And what’s Thread?

Matter is an overarching standard, painstakingly developed even as low-power sensing devices and other equipment proliferated in silos. Matter enables Amazon Alexa, Apple Home, Google Home, and Samsung SmartThings devices to communicate across a network, regardless of the network transport medium (Ethernet, Thread, or Wi-Fi). This prevents you from needing ecosystem-specific hubs and lets manufacturers build to a common standard.

Thread fits into this mix as a low-power, wireless networking standard for sensors, allowing them to communicate their status without rapidly draining their batteries, as would happen with Wi-Fi.⁵ Apple initially supported Thread with a proprietary standard, HomeKit-over-Thread, and later added direct Matter support. The Eve sensor was just old enough that it was running on the older standard, but the Eve app allowed me to apply a firmware upgrade. I could then migrate the sensor to Matter, which seems to be more reliable.

Apple made things a little confusing here, too. The 1st-generation Apple TV 4K supports Matter, but lacks a Thread radio, so it can’t work with Thread-based devices. The 2nd generation added that radio, so you can do Matter over Thread. But then, with the 3rd generation, Apple bifurcated Thread hardware support: the 64 GB Wi-Fi only model lacks a Thread radio; you have to spend the now-whopping $249 for a 128 GB Wi-Fi + Ethernet version if you want to use Thread.

Failing an Apple TV 4K with Thread, you can use a Thread border router (TBR), which sometimes comes with sensor kits. This plugs into your network via Wi-Fi or Ethernet and bridges to the Thread network, allowing the Apple TV’s Matter controller to work with the Home app on your devices for automations, notifications, and so forth.

It’s that easy, folks. Sigh.

I do own a 3rd-generation Apple TV 4K with Wi-Fi + Ethernet, because I am a fancy man and a big spender, but I really wanted the reliability of plugging it into my Ethernet network. Yet, I couldn’t get the Eve sensor’s Thread radio to reach across my house to talk to the Apple TV. I bought a TBR, thinking it would solve the problem.

By the time the TBR was delivered, however, the garage door sensor magically connected via Thread to the Apple TV and has been rock solid. The TBR that arrived, on the other hand, I was unable to pair and get working, so back it goes for a refund.

Now my nightly Shortcut works! The only fly in that ointment is that the sensor status reports as Closed or Open in iOS and iPadOS, but as 0 (closed) or 1 (open) in the macOS Home app, in both macOS 26 and the beta of 27. I can live with running the Shortcut from my phone.

[Got a question for the column? You can email glenn@sixcolors.com or use /glenn in our subscriber-only Discord community.]