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Apple’s HomePod Mini 2 Is Just as Tiny, but My Tests Found Powerful Upgrades

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Apple’s HomePod Mini 2 Is Just as Tiny, but My Tests Found Powerful Upgrades

What’s inside the 2026 HomePod, especially its audio, helps it stand apart from the old HomePod Mini, but Siri AI remains an open question.

Apple’s extensive October announcements featured a new push into the smart home, heralded not only with new security equipment and the first-ever HomeView smart display, but also a long-awaited update to the HomePod smart speaker line, the HomePod Mini 2 ($150).

It’s a bit more expensive than the old HomePod Mini ($129) and significantly more expensive than Google’s new Home speaker ($100), but price is only part of the story. This new HomePod model looks and acts so much like the original Mini, it can be hard to tell if you need an upgrade.

Now I’ve just finished testing out the little speaker and its capabilities: The trick is that Apple’s description of the speaker is nearly identical to the old model, but performance shows major differences, and not just with Siri.

If you really want an audio upgrade from your old Mini, Apple delivered in a big way, though it still won’t compete with the original HomePod. I’m less sold on other features, which can seem like upgrades for the sake of upgrading with limited value, but if you’ve been waiting for a powerful home speaker that fits right into the Apple ecosystem and all Siri AI’s latest tricks, this is a worthy upgrade.

Anyone could be forgiven for mistaking the 2026 HomePod Mini for its 2021 counterpart.



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