Page 58 - iPhone Life Magazine - Spring 2020
P. 58

Apple HomePod










             WHICH





             SPEAKER IS





             SMARTER?







             BY CULLEN THOMAS













                      HomePod ($299): The HomePod is Apple’s
                      smart speaker that combines its Siri voice

                      assistant with its proprietary HomeKit
                      smart home hub.









                                                                                      had me and my roommate laughing, thinking, and trying out
             Quick Take:                                                              more and more queries. Generally, Alexa answered a greater
                                                                                      variety of questions, and in far greater depth. I will defi nitely
               Amazon’s Alexa is more versatile than Siri, with a deeper              be turning to Alexa for answers, and as somebody who asks
             skillset, a ton of built-in functions, and even more third-party         a lot of questions, that’s a huge plus. Add on to that the ability
             skills. As a smart home hub, the Echo was easier to set up               to order products (including food off Amazon) and the vast
             and harder to mess up. That said, the HomePod enjoys a ro-               library of third-party skills, including games that turn your
             bust advantage in security and privacy matters and works well            voice assistant into a quiz show host, narrate choose-your-
             in the Apple ecosystem. There are reasons to go either way,              own-adventure stories, or read off an endless supply of dad
             but in my opinion, there is a clear winner.                              jokes. By now you might think there isn’t much room for Siri
                                                                                      to compete. Alexa can both answer questions and do tasks
                                                                                      better, right?
                                                                                        Not quite. Siri does compete. Siri may not narrate cross-
             The Ups:                                                                 word puzzles, but when it comes to handling basic tasks, Siri

                                                                                      enjoys the home-fi eld advantage for iPhone users. Apple’s
             SMART ASSISTANT SKILLS                                                   ecosystem of branded apps all work together, and Siri can
                                                                                      reach into any of them. When you ask Siri to remind you about
               A voice assistant can help you in two ways: answer your                something, it shows up in your Reminders app. When you ask
             questions about factual matters and do things with connected             Siri to make a phone call, it sends it to your iPhone. There is a
             devices, apps, and services. When it comes to answering                  real benefi t to the way Siri works with the apps and devices
             questions, Alexa’s range of whimsical and informative replies            you already know and use.
                                                                                        So, who has the better skills? If you buy deeply into Apple’s



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