Apple could be planning a surprise Amazon Astro robot rival for your smart home

Hey Siri, fetch the vacuum

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Let’s be honest,Apple’sreportedly canceled self-driving car projectsounds like it was a bit of a disaster. But don’t think that Apple throwing in the towel means the company has given up on moonshot ideas. No, if a new report is correct, it looks like Apple has quickly moved onto its next big thing – and we guarantee it’s not what you were expecting.

According toBloomberg’s Mark Gurman, Apple is working on a personal robot that could use artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms to follow you around your home, performing useful tasks and being a general helper around the house.

Gurman says that Apple “has teams investigating a push into personal robotics.” Proposed products include “a mobile robot that can follow users around their homes” and “an advanced table-top home device that uses robotics to move a display around.”

That second idea sounds a lot like the rumoredHomePod with an iPad displaythat has been doing the rounds recently. However, Gurman’s report makes clear that that is a separate device. Clearly, though, Apple is thinking seriously about how it can integrate its products even further into your home life – including with an unlikelyAmazonAstro rival.

Apple’s next big thing?

Although these concepts might have an air of the fantastical about them, Gurman has a solid record when it comes to Apple leaks and rumors. These projects are reportedly in their early stages, though, so they might never see the light of day.

Apple’s ambitions for its robot project may also have been scaled down. According to Bloomberg’s report, the original idea was “a device that could navigate entirely on its own without human intervention — like the car — and serve as a videoconferencing tool”. But a robot that can help with your chores is apparently off the table until the 2030s, due to the tricky engineering challenges.

With thecancelation of Apple’s self-driving car, it seems the company is desperate to find the “next big thing” that will carry it into the coming decades. Is theApple Vision Pronot that next big thing? Gurman thinks not, if only because it’s “expected to take years to become a major moneymaker.”

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So, while we wait for the Vision Pro’sprice to come downand for the device to really enter the mainstream, it seems like we could one day get Apple-branded robo-helpers performing household chores for us. Now there’s a sentence we never thought we’d write.

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Alex Blake has been fooling around with computers since the early 1990s, and since that time he’s learned a thing or two about tech. No more than two things, though. That’s all his brain can hold. As well as TechRadar, Alex writes for iMore, Digital Trends and Creative Bloq, among others. He was previously commissioning editor at MacFormat magazine. That means he mostly covers the world of Apple and its latest products, but also Windows, computer peripherals, mobile apps, and much more beyond. When not writing, you can find him hiking the English countryside and gaming on his PC.

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