HomePad reportedly delayed (again), and it’s all Siri’s fault (again)

Apple’s first-ever smart home display, which the company hoped to launch this spring, reportedly encountered another development problem. It will now only appear in the fall, according to the latest rumors, and you guessed it, it’s all Siri’s fault.

Writing for Bloomberg, analyst Mark Gurman claims that Apple had previously planned for its first wave of smart home devices to run a “variant” of tvOS 26, the current Apple TV operating system, but has now pushed that back to tvOS 27. Like the rest of the 27 operating system updates, tvOS 27 will be announced in June at WWDC 2026 before being released to the public in September.

Instead of launching in the spring as expected, the HomePad, a smart home hub with a built-in display, is now expected to launch in the fall. This change of plans, Gurman says, is entirely due to problems with Siri; the material has been ready for some time. It is based on the testimony of anonymous sources familiar with the case.

If that seems tenuous, it’s worth noting that Gurman’s claims are corroborated by another leaker. In fact, Kosutami, who has made accurate predictions in the past, released “Autumn. Home. Integrated into Pad. Now Coming”. some time Before Gurman published his article, so it’s really the latter that corroborates the former.

Apple hasn’t announced anything publicly, but the company is believed to be working on a major advancement in the smart home space. This includes two tiers of smart home hubs: the fixed wall-mounted HomePad device with a 7-inch screen, focused on HomeKit and FaceTime calling, and a high-end robotic hub featuring a screen mounted on a robotic arm, which is expected to launch at a later date.

Both devices, however, will depend for their convenience and usability on effective voice control, which is why Siri is so key in their release, and why Siri’s current woes are such a problem. Apple announced a new, more sophisticated version of Siri in June 2024, but the project has been hit by a series of disastrous delays.

On the plus side, the extra six months could give Apple a chance to tinker with the hardware side somewhat. In a separate post on Twitter/X, Kosutami adds that the device could have an intriguing “MagSafe wall hanging feature” and “it can [ring] your door”, which probably means it lets you see who’s ringing your doorbell. Both seem like useful additions, if Apple can ever launch the thing.