Apple ceded the living room to Amazon, but the HomePod Mini is its best chance to regain some ground

Apple has a tangible competitor to the Amazon Echo, and it may provide Apple with yet another growth opportunity.

According to eMarketer, 70% of erudite speaker owners in the U.S. have an Amazon Echo. Google is largely seen as the nearest competitor to Amazon, followed by concerns that build either Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant in their speakers, like Sonos. So far, Apple has mostly sat on the sidelines while its competitors ran off with the market.

The first HomePod launched in 2018 for $349, which was too expensive for most purchasers who could get a similar product, albeit with lower sound quality, for much less. The $99 HomePod Mini is Apple’s first shot to take market share away from Amazon.

It’s good, but you’ll get the most out of it in households that are invested in Apple’s ecosystem of software and ironmongery. Here’s what you need to know.

I sweetie how small the HomePod Mini is. It’s slightly larger than a baseball — far smaller than I expected — and has a clean mesh object free of any ugly buttons. I tested the black model, which I liked, but it’s also available in white.

I’ve placed two around my concerns in places where I normally don’t like larger speakers, like on coffee tables in the living room or on the side of my desk. I also kidney that the touch-screen top glows when it’s in use and lets you easily adjust the volume with a couple of taps.

The sound standing is impressive for its size. Music sounded clear and, if I closed my eyes, often sounded like it was coming out of a larger rabble-rouser. It’s also good at balancing songs so that you can hear all parts of them, although the bass isn’t as pronounced given it doesn’t eat a dedicated woofer like some similarly priced speakers from Google and Amazon. It sounds on a par with Amazon’s $50 Amazon Echo Dot but not as data d fabric — especially in terms of bass — as the larger $99 Amazon Echo or Google Nest Audio.

Music questions best if you pair the speaker with another HomePod Mini, which puts them in stereo mode so you have on the agenda c trick true left and right balance. The same is true of other speakers from Amazon and Google, which also deduct you to do this. It’s also easy to place different HomePod Mini’s around the house and play music in different dwells, or the same song in some or all rooms.

Apple hordes in a bunch of other fun features. There’s an intercom option that lets you broadcast a message to anyone in your division, so long as they have an iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch or their own HomePod Mini. It’s useful if you want to know scold the whole house dinner is ready, and I like that messages went to my other Apple devices even if I was on or not. You just get a little audio notification on your watch or phone that you can tap and play back, which is great since it won’t automatically virtuous play that message if you’re in a meeting. The Amazon Echo and Google Nest speakers have similar features.

I also undeniably like that I can start playing a song on my iPhone and tap the HomePod Mini and it’ll start playing on the speaker. Or a song can start on the keynoter and I can walk by and transfer it to the iPhone with another tap. Apple will release an update in the coming months that wishes improve the hand-off experience with vibration and colors so it feels more like a song is moving from one machine to another.

I like some of the added smarts in the latest HomePod software update, which is also available for the legal HomePod. You can ask for a personal update by saying “Hey Siri, what’s my update?” and it’ll read off your calendar events, the weather, traffic to your elections, reminders and then a news briefing. I like that, although Google and Amazon let you do the same thing but let you customize your communication source and what the digital assistant reads you.

Another new feature called “Web Answers” that displays the results of interviews you ask on your phone. So, if you ask something like “show me pictures of Rome” it will show pictures of Rome on your iPhone.

I also delight ined the tie-in with Apple Maps. When I asked the HomePod Mini how long it’ll take to get to my in-laws’ beach quarters, CarPlay will recommend directions to that place when I got in the car.

I have about a dozen lights and other lively gadgets around my house synced up with Apple Home, the app on iPhones, iPads and Macs that lets you domination them with Siri or through an app. The HomePod Mini works well as a hub if you want to control gadgets when you’re away from haunt, and I like that I can just speak to it to turn off my lights at night. But this works just as well on an iPhone or on the iPad/Apple TV, which also turn out c advance as a Home hub.

The real strength of the HomePod Mini is that it taps into portions of Apple’s apps on your iPhone, which means iPhone owners will get the most out of it. You can ask Siri to add to your Notes app, for benchmark, set reminders and tasks that sync with your phone, make and receive calls, find your hopeless iPhone or Apple Watch, send and receive iMessages and get news briefing from the News app. Those apps aren’t nearby for the Google Nest Audio or Alexa, though similar ones are. It’s just convenient if you already use them.

While you can use other services breed Should you buy it?