It’s a touch frustrating that there’s no way of connecting external devices to the HomePod. Similarly, you can direct audio from your Mac to the HomePod using AirPlay. If you watch regular TV or play a Blu-ray, for example, you only get your standard TV sound.
I say kind of, as only audio from your Apple TV is played through the speaker. This being an Apple product, you can link your Apple TV to your HomePod using it as a kind of soundbar. If you’re primarily a Spotify or Tidal user, you’ll be better off using a different system, such as Sonos, which lets you link one account and play different tracks in each room simultaneously. For example, I found that stopping the stream and switching to a different app, such as YouTube, ended up with sound being sent to the HomePod.ĭon’t want to use Apple Music? You’ll need to use the AirPlay controls insteadĪnd you can’t play different tracks to different HomePod speakers using the same streaming account, nor can you transfer music from your phone to HomePod if you’re not using Apple Music. Casting is fine, and you can even do something different on your phone while casting music but there are some oddities. So far, so good, but what about if you use Spotify? Well, you have to go into the Spotify app, use the pull-down menu and select your HomePod as the AirPlay 2 destination. Voice search works about as well here as it does on other smart speakers, which is to say that you’ll end up with a fair amount of random music playing I much prefer to find the track I want to play using an app. Using Apple Music, you can use Siri voice control to manage playback, searching for tracks, pausing and skipping. As you’d expect, you can also group multiple HomePods if you want multi-room music. You can control your HomePod directly from Apple MusicĬleverly, if you’ve got multiple HomePods, then each one can have a different track playing using the same Apple account. That’s really neat, and it’s a trick that applies to phone calls, too, letting you transfer from your handset to your HomePod. And, if you’re listening to Apple Music on your phone out and about, when you get back home, you can just tap your phone to the top of the HomePod and transfer your music to carry on listening. If you’re a subscriber and like Apple Music (I do), the HomePod works brilliantly.įrom the Apple Music app (iOS or macOS), you can select your HomePod from the drop-down list and control the music playing and volume directly. Apple has built the HomePod to work with its own streaming service, Apple Music. Here’s where things are either completely brilliant or rather annoying. It all takes a matter of minutes, and the HomePod will be connected and running your network. Chances are, if you’re interested in the HomePod, you’ll have Apple devices.Ĭonfiguration is super easy: just plug in the speaker and put your phone in the same room, and you’ll get a pop-up telling you that there’s a HomePod ready to be configured. If you’ve only got Android devices in your home, there’s no alternative way of configuring the HomePod. More fiddly to get working with Spotify or other servicesĪs an Apple device, the HomePod requires an iOS device to set it up and manage it via the Home app, which is also the place for your HomeKit-compatible smart home devices.Power is provided by a single captive cable, which is a bit of a shame, as if this gets damaged, you’ll have to send the entire speaker off for repair. The signs that this is anything but a bog-standard Wi-Fi speaker are all here.
Weight is mainly due to the internals: a custom amp, seven 360-degree tweeters and one massive subwoofer. Weight comes as something of a shock, with the speaker weighing a hefty 2.5kg, making it rather brick-like. The HomePod remains one of the best looking smart speakersįor all the audio prowess the speaker promises, the HomePod is surprisingly small (172 x 142 x 142mm), and not much bigger than the current Amazon Echo 3rd Gen.
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