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The HomePod Is Already Hurting The Echo ( A Little Bit)

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A few weeks ago I wrote an article about why I thought the HomePod would be popular, And time has gone by and the HomePod has been out on the market for a few weeks now. So I thought it would be a great idea to look back and see how the HomePod has been fairing in cut-throat smart-speaker market.

The HomePod Is Off To A Great Start, What A Surprise

Appleinsider came out with a report detailing how the HomePod has been received by the public. To no ones surprise the HomePod has a customer satisfaction score of 89%. But the report also went on to say that people don't really expect a whole lot from their smart speakers. All people really care about are the basic functionalities of a smart speaker.

 

Looking at what the average person uses their smart speaker for its clear that "intelligence" doesn't  really matter. You could have the best AI assistant and your speaker would still fail if it is a crappy speaker. Lots of people have been critiquing Siri for being to dumb (Although I don't think so). So usage patterns like these negates the disadvantage Siri supposedly has in the intelligence department.
Siri nails everything on that list. Even with general questions with iOS 11 Siri has got a lot smarter at answering general questions even though she is not at a Google Assistant level yet. The only thing Siri can't do at the moment is buying things and hopefully that will come soon.

Still The HomePod Has A Long Way To Go

The report also goes on to give us a breakdown of how popular each smart speaker is.

So the HomePod has a 3% market share at the moment. It is even lagging behind Cortana at the moment but this signifies that the HomePod has some momentum in the industry. Even though the Echo and Home are far ahead, they should be prepared to lose some of their iOS subscribers as Siri works just fine for the average user. It is clear that Apple did their homework before launching the HomePod. If the HomePod didn't sound as good as it does not would just be another speaker in the market even if Siri were to be exponentially smarter. So does this mean that the Echo and the Google Home are done for? No not by a long shot. I Expect more people who use an iOS device to switch to  the  HomePod and Apple Music and the Echo and Home Will compete for the Spotify crowd. Expect great things from the HomePod.

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