Tag: PC Magazine Tech123

Apple Music has hiked its subscription fee for the first time since late 2022, while the Apple One bundle is also getting more expensive.

In the US, Apple Music’s Individual plan jumped to $11.99 per month from $10.99. Apple Music’s Family plan also rose from $16.99 to $19.99, while its Student price increased from $5.99 to $6.99. In a statement to Music Business Worldwide, Apple chalked up the changes to “rising licensing costs.”

An individual subscription to Apple One, which grants you access Apple Music, Apple TV, Apple Arcade, and 50GB of storage on iCloud+, will remain unchanged at $19.95. But a Family plan will now cost you $27.95, up from $25.95, and a Premier plan will now cost you $39.95, up from $37.95. This is the bundle’s first price hike since October 2023.

Apple also announced similar price rises in the UK and the EU, and it’s expected they will soon apply to other regions as well.

But Apple isn’t the only music streaming giant making price hikes, though it still edges out its closest rival Spotify on price. In February, Spotify raised its Premium plan from $11.99 to $12.99 per month, just one dollar more than Apple Music, and its Student plan moved from $5.99 to $6.99.

Spotify’s Duo and Family plans also saw $2 price hikes. Its Duo plan now costs $18.99 per month, up from $16.99, while its Family plan now costs $21.99 per month, up from $19.99.

YouTube Music’s Individual plan now sits neck and neck with Apple’s offering from a cost perspective. In April, YouTube Music’s individual plan increased from $10.99 to $11.99 per month, and the family plan rose from $16.99 to $18.99 per month.

“Streamflation” remains a serious issue for consumers, prices for streaming services of all kinds are rising faster than the rest of the US economy. Streaming service inflation was 20% in December 2025 according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, higher than any other category, rising over five times faster than essentials like food and utilities. Almost every major streaming service has announced price increases over the past year including Netflix, HBO Max, Prime Video and Disney+.

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I’m a reporter covering weekend news. Before joining PCMag in 2024, I picked up bylines in BBC News, The Guardian, The Times of London, The Daily Beast, Vice, Slate, Fast Company, The Evening Standard, The i, TechRadar, and Decrypt Media.

I’ve been a PC gamer since you had to install games from multiple CD-ROMs by hand. As a reporter, I’m passionate about the intersection of tech and human lives. I’ve covered everything from crypto scandals to the art world, as well as conspiracy theories, UK politics, and Russia and foreign affairs.

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TL;DR: A lifetime subscription to ChatPlayground AI is on sale for $59.97 (reg. $619) through July 19. It runs the same prompt through more than 20 AI models at once, so you can compare answers without juggling tabs.

Relying on a single AI model means trusting a single answer. ChatPlayground AI sends a single prompt to multiple models simultaneously and puts their responses side by side, including ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Deepseek, Llama, and Perplexity. That covers chat, coding help, content drafts, and image ideas in a single workflow, with no copy-pasting between apps to compare outputs.

The All-In-One AI App Includes

• Prompt engineering tools to refine and reuse prompts that perform well

• Image and PDF uploads, so you can ask questions about a document and see how each model interprets it

• Saved chat history to revisit longer projects and past prompts

• Support on any desktop running a recent version of Chrome, Edge, or Firefox

The Unlimited Plan included here is a lifetime license with unlimited monthly messages and no cap on sign-in devices, built for prompt engineers, startups, and teams that use AI heavily enough to need room to experiment. It’s also priced below what ChatPlayground charges for the same plan on its own site, so this is the cheapest way to own it outright.

Get a ChatPlayground AI lifetime subscription for $59.97, down from $619, before the deal ends July 19.

ChatPlayground AI

Lifetime Subscription to the Unlimited Plan

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Prices subject to change. PCMag editors select and review products independently. If you buy through StackSocial affiliate links, we may earn commissions, which help support our testing.

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StackCommerce Team (Sponsored)

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Products featured in these stories are selected by our partners at StackCommerce. If you buy something through links on our site, PCMag may earn an affiliate commission.

Latest By StackCommerce Team (Sponsored)

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AI agents are more capable than ever before, and are finally seeing widespread adoption. But even if you’re comfortable with one completing a purchase on your behalf or booking a hotel, do you really want to give them a password? If not, you’re likely not alone—68% of Americans wouldn’t let AI act without their specific approval, according to research from YouGov. AI agents can be manipulated by what are called prompt engineering attacks, and can leave users legally liable for their behaviour.

If you choose not to give an AI agent your password, it’s easy to be trapped in a constant cycle of inputting your details or completing 2FA again and again, potentially defeating the point of having an autonomous agent doing tasks in the background.

Password manager 1Password’s new tool, 1Password for Claude, allows Anthropic’s chatbot to complete browser tasks that require logins and one-time passcodes, without ever requiring you to enter your credentials into the model or store them in its memory. For example, a small business owner could ask Claude to create a revenue summary or to flag any unusual activity using data from popular payment solutions like Stripe.

Claude can then navigate the dashboard independently, and the business owner can approve Claude to use their Stripe login details. 1Password handles the credential and one-time passcode, and the task is completed without ever manually logging into Stripe or handing an LLM your sensitive login details.

The company has also included some security features to mitigate the risks associated with agentic browsers, where an agent could potentially get control of a browser with 1Password already installed.

Agentic Mode, a new feature in the 1Password browser extension, means the password manager shuts down when a compatible AI agent takes over, locking down 1Password. With Agentic Mode, the interface is hidden, and the agent can only use the logins and one-time passcodes explicitly approved for the current task.

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1Password for Claude is available now for Mac, across its business, family, and individual plans. For instructions on how to get the integration up and running, head to 1Password’s documentation page. You’ll need 1Password for Mac (version 8.12.28 or later), 1Password browser extension (version 8.12.28 or later), the Claude desktop app, and the Claude browser extension.

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I’m a reporter covering weekend news. Before joining PCMag in 2024, I picked up bylines in BBC News, The Guardian, The Times of London, The Daily Beast, Vice, Slate, Fast Company, The Evening Standard, The i, TechRadar, and Decrypt Media.

I’ve been a PC gamer since you had to install games from multiple CD-ROMs by hand. As a reporter, I’m passionate about the intersection of tech and human lives. I’ve covered everything from crypto scandals to the art world, as well as conspiracy theories, UK politics, and Russia and foreign affairs.

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A glitch at Amazon’s cloud services division, Amazon Web Services (AWS), left consumers all over the world with bills that would bankrupt even Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

According to a post on X, first spotted by The Guardian, a user in India named Bharath got hit with a particularly astounding bill.

“I just saw $1.5tn on my AWS bill and my soul left my body,” he told his followers.

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Dan Harvey, who leads marketing at UK company Learning Through Landscapes, found that his cloud hosting bill had skyrocketed from 43 cents to $7.8 billion, a jump of roughly 1.8 trillion percent.

He told The Guardian he “almost had a heart attack” when he received the notification.

Meanwhile, one user on Reddit said his bill was over $7 trillion, higher than the GDP of the UK and Canada combined.

Amazon confirmed that the bills were mistaken in a post on X earlier today, and users were not expected to take any action to correct the issue. Amazon confirmed it was working on fixing the problem, but that it may take some time for the bills to show up correctly in user’s accounts.

The tech giant didn’t give many hints as to the true cause of the fault, but according to Amazon’s Service Health page, the issue was due to a problem “affecting estimated cost and usage data displayed in the Billing and Cost Management Console, including the Cost and Usage Report.”

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If you’d like to prevent issues like this from happening in the future, AWS CEO Matt Garman has gone on record to say that the division will continue to hire developers amid the AI boom, and that demand is “really accelerating”. It plans to hire 10,000 this year.

About Our Expert

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Experience

I’m a reporter covering weekend news. Before joining PCMag in 2024, I picked up bylines in BBC News, The Guardian, The Times of London, The Daily Beast, Vice, Slate, Fast Company, The Evening Standard, The i, TechRadar, and Decrypt Media.

I’ve been a PC gamer since you had to install games from multiple CD-ROMs by hand. As a reporter, I’m passionate about the intersection of tech and human lives. I’ve covered everything from crypto scandals to the art world, as well as conspiracy theories, UK politics, and Russia and foreign affairs.

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The hunt for electronics deals is a constantly changing one, as retailers and brands raise and lower prices in response to all sorts of factors. At the core, though, are the detailed reviews that PCMag’s experts write daily. I refuse to recommend a product that hasn’t been extensively tested by my co-workers, because I know that they are thorough, unbiased, and have decades of experience. It’s my job to take those high-quality items and find the deepest discounts, and that’s what we have here: five great products at price cuts of up to 50% off.

Garmin Venu Sq Smartwatch

1.41-inch AMOLED display, Android, iOS, 8 days battery life

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There are plenty of smartwatch brands on the market, but one that often runs under the radar is Garmin, which made its name in GPS before venturing into wearables. We gave the Venu Sq an Editors’ Choice award in our review, with watch expert Angela Moscaritolo saying it easily lapped the similarly-priced Apple Watch SE and Galaxy Watch 5, with better battery life, tons of fitness tracking tools, and a big, bright display. Geolocation is a big part of the feature set, with over 25 built-in indoor and GPS sports apps to track a wide variety of exercises, as well as preloaded and customizable workout routines. Even if you’re not a health nut, cool features like mobile payments, weather forecasts, and other stuff make it worth the cash.

TCL QM8L 65-inch 4K SQD-Mini LED Smart TV

65-inch display, 4K, 144Hz refresh rate, Google TV

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$2,499.99
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One of the most important metrics we evaluate in our TV reviews is brightness. Without a potent enough backlight, your screen can be washed out or even unusable when the sun is out. That’s why we were so dazzled by the TCL QM8L in our review that we gave it an Editors’ Choice award and a first-ever Lab Test Winner award. This is the brightest TV we’ve ever tested, with color quality and contrast to match, even when viewing from the diagonal. It’s a powerhouse that excels for streaming, gaming, and sports. We even praised the remote control, which has backlighting, a customizable shortcut button, and a rocker switch that adjusts brightness without opening a menu. Best Buy has it on sale for 30% off.

Nothing Phone (3)

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There’s no mobile device that looks like the Nothing Phone (3), and it packs enough cool functionality to match its design. Made by a British company looking to stand out as an alternative to the big brands, it’s made from 100% recycled aluminum with Gorilla Glass 7i protecting the 6.67-inch AMOLED display. Peak brightness of 4,500 nits is outrageously good. On the back, there are solid cameras and the unique Glyph Matrix, an array of 489 micro-LEDs that display text and visualizations. The Qualcomm Snapdragon 8s Gen 4 processor is powerful enough for high-end mobile gaming, and both battery life and charging time also impressed us. You can read our full review for all the details.

Roborock Saros Z70 Robot Vacuum

Vacuum / mop, 111 minutes battery life,

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We love it when companies take big swings, and the Saros Z70 is an absolutely wild take on the traditional robot vacuum, with a five-axis robotic arm protruding from the top. That mechanical limb is used for all kinds of things while it cleans your floor. It can pick up objects as heavy as 10.58 ounces and deposit them in pre-selected areas, so if you leave your socks everywhere, it’ll take them back to the bin. You can also manually control the robot arm while it’s cleaning, using the onboard camera with an app on your phone to target items. In our review, we were impressed by how well it navigated, never getting stuck in all of our tests, as well as having good battery life.

Turtle Beach Stealth Pro Gaming Headset

USB, Bluetooth, active noise cancellation, 12 hours battery life

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$169.94
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$329.99
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If audio quality is just as important as visuals in your gaming life, you should really pick up a high-quality headset. Luckily for you, the excellent Turtle Beach Stealth Pro is on sale for 49% off right now at Amazon. That’s the lowest price we’ve seen it. We have a detailed review of this model, with high praise for its exceptional active noise cancellation, which effectively blots out the world to give you peak concentration. We also liked the dual swappable batteries, letting you charge and play at the same time, and the microphone was clear and responsive. At almost half off, you can’t go wrong with this one.

Want to keep even more money in your pocket? Our deals page saves you tons on top tech.

About Our Expert

K. Thor Jensen

Contributing Writer

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K. Thor Jensen is a writer and cartoonist living in the Pacific Northwest. He has contributed to dozens of prestigious outlets, including PCMag, Tested, Clickhole, and Newsweek. His second graphic novel, Cloud Stories, was released in 2017.

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Whether you’re a student turning in a homework assignment (on time, of course) or an entrepreneur burning the midnight oil on your latest project, the screens we choose to work on have a huge impact on our daily lives.

You might opt for a compact ultraportable that fits into a small bag, or maybe you prefer posting up at massive monitors hooked up to your home office’s desktop PC. Both choices have their perks, but what if you could have the best of both worlds: the screen real estate of a desktop and the portability of a laptop? 

Let me introduce you to the HP OmniBook X. Specifically, the one with a monstrous 17.3-inch display. Its super spacious screen pushes it into desktop-replacement territory, but it still retains the portability of a traditional laptop. Now I know what you’re thinking: there’s a catch, and it has a dollar sign in front of it. Well, not today — Best Buy has this particular configuration on sale for 46% off, slashing an astounding $700 off the $1,499.99 list price and bringing the total down to under $800. That’s an impressive deal on a big-screen laptop.

HP OmniBook X 

17.3-inch IPS display, FHD touch screen, Intel Core Ultra 7 (2024), 16GB RAM, 512GB SSD

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Let’s begin with the star of this laptop show: the 17.3-inch display. Not only is it spacious enough to open all the windows and apps you want side-by-side, but it’s also a Full HD 1080p touchscreen that reaches up to 400 nits of brightness. So, if you want to shake things up and get away from the trackpad workflow, you can lift your hands off the keyboard and tap away on the display. Thanks to integrated Intel Arc 140V graphics, you don’t need a separate card to enjoy beautiful visuals or creative work. However, it isn’t potent enough for heavy-duty gaming, so if you’re looking for something more capable in that department, check out our list of the best gaming laptops for 2026. 

This configuration is powered by an Intel Core Ultra 7 Series 2 processor, which supports highly demanding productivity sessions, content creation (hello 4K video and photo editing), and even local AI processing, which is handy considering this is a Copilot+ PC. Between the screen and processing power, this laptop is a catch-all workhorse for students, creatives, and remote professionals who need to get their work done quickly. Throw in a solid 16GB of RAM and a roomy 512GB SSD, and you have plenty of memory to tear through your to-do list and dredge up the files you need to complete any tasks. 

When we reviewed a slightly different (and smaller) version of the OmniBook X, laptop expert Matthew Buzzi gave it an “Excellent” rating, especially praising its generous port selection, which includes USB-A connectivity. For almost half off, the 17.3-inch OmniBook X is a killer deal for productive professionals and casual users alike who are itching for a bigger screen to stare at. 

If you’re looking for something different, browse our experts’ list of the best laptops for 2026.

Since many of us work in front a computer, we should still take care of ourselves and keep comfortable, especially when sitting for hours on end. Not only would an ergonomic chair or functional keyboard help, but so would an ergonomic mouse. Those can help alleviate any pain in your wrist! Over at Amazon, the Logitech MX vertical mouse for 41% off, marked down to $71.24 from its original $119.99 listing. That’s $48.75 in savings!

Logitech MX Vertical Mouse

57-degree angle, 4000 DPI, 8 ounces

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$71.24
at Amazon

$119.99
Save $48.75

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As of July 16, the Logitech MX vertical mouse is 41% off, bringing the price down from $119.99 to $71.24. According to camelcamelcamel, this is the lowest price it’s been since last year, so now’s the best time to get this deal!

The mouse sits at a 57-degree angle that reduces pressure on your wrist, allowing your thumb to sit properly. This helps decrease muscular activity by 10% compared to a standard mouse without any negative impact to performance. Its ergonomic shape is designed for the human hand and has a textured rubber surface that lets you grip the mouse comfortably but firmly. The mouse also fits various hand shapes and sizes so you won’t have to worry about whether it’s too big or small for you.

The sensor also has 4000 DPI compared to a standard mouse’s 1000 DPI. This results in a more precise and accurate mouse, while also reducing hand movement and fatigue. You can also adjust DPI speed and accuracy in order to make your comfort level even more personalized.

Contributor Mike Epstein awarded it a “Good” rating. In our Logitech MX Vertical Mouse review, he said, “Logitech’s wireless MX Vertical Ergonomic Mouse is incredibly comfortable, but that comfort could come at the price of reduced productivity for some users.”

If you’re looking for alternatives, check out the Razer Pro Click V2 Vertical or the GoldTouch Semi-vertical.

Check out our other mice coverage and Amazon deals.

If you’re using an ebook reader, there’s a good chance it’s an Amazon Kindle. They’re must-have devices for voracious readers, but they are closely tied to Amazon’s ecosystem. If you have a Fire tablet or a smartphone, you can download other e-reading apps to beef up your library, but with the Kindle hardware, you’re pretty much stuck to getting your content directly from Amazon—sort of. Using a bit of free software, you can take ebooks in a variety of formats and zap them over to your Kindle. Here’s how to do it and where to nab free ebooks.

Where Do I Get Free Ebooks?

(Credit: Amazon/PCMag)

For Prime members, Amazon First Reads offers early access to editors’ picks. Each month, you can download one Kindle book for free; in July, Amazon is also offering a bonus short read. (Non-Prime members can snag a First Read book for $1.99.) Head to the First Reads website, and sign up to get a newsletter that will alert you to each month’s First Reads. If you subscribe to Kindle Unlimited, all the books will be added there once they’re released.

Other Free E-Book Options

• Amazon hosts periodic Stuff Your Kindle Days, where select ebooks are free for a 24-hour period (or more). Here’s a list for 2026 and a sampling of those coming up soon:

  • August 15-16, 2026: Fantasy and Sci-Fi Worlds hosted by Book Below, offering fantasy, science fiction, and paranormal books.

  • August 5–8, 2026: Stuff Your E-Reader hosted by Indie Author Collective, offering books in a variety of subgenres.

  • August 5-8, 2026: Buzzfest hosted by Indie Author Hive, offering books of all genres.

  • August 15-16, 2026: Fantasy and Sci-Fi Worlds hosted by Book Below, offering fantasy, science fiction, and paranormal books.

  • September 12, 2026: Queer Your Ereader hosted by Divination Hollow, offering books with LGBTQIA+ themes and characters.

• To hook into public library catalogs and send ebooks to your Kindle, check out the Libby app from OverDrive. (Hoopla offers a similar service.)

• If you want classics, Project Gutenberg has 75,000+ copyright-free ebooks. You can also trying searching for PDFs using the filetype:pdf search operator ([book title] filetype:pdf).

• For historical and academic texts, check out archive.org.

• ManyBooks.net has a mix of free and paid classics and self-published titles.

• Free-Ebooks.net has a large collection of self-published ebooks and classics; provide your email address to get five free ebooks per month.

• If you like science fiction, the publisher Baen also has a set of free ebooks.

• BookBub has a free ebook section filled with romance novels and other casual reads.

Upload Via ‘Send to Kindle’

Now that you have your free ebooks, how do you get them on your ebook reader? Amazon offers a Send to Kindle page where you can upload ebook files saved on your device. Click Select files from device and select the book you want on your Kindle.

(Credit: Amazon/PCMag)

This tool supports PDF, DOC, DOCX, TXT, RTF, HTM, HTML, PNG, GIF, JPG, JPEG, BMP, and EPUB formats on ebooks up to 200MB in size. (Amazon no longer supports sending new Mobi files.) A status bar will appear, letting you keep tabs on the upload. When it’s ready, there will be a checkmark and an In library notice.

(Credit: Amazon/PCMag)

Amazon also has an app for Windows and macOS that lets you do the same thing, as does a Chrome extension, though results are mixed on the latter. Keep in mind that Amazon has discontinued the ability to download ebooks to your computer.

Send Ebooks to the Kindle From Your Phone

If you have the Kindle app installed on your iPhone or Android device, you can add ebooks to your library with a few taps. In the example below, I downloaded an ebook from Project Gutenberg on my iPhone, which saved it to the Files app. I then long-pressed on the ebook, selected Share, and picked the Kindle app in the menu. It then appeared in my library in the Kindle app as well as on my Kindle Paperwhite. The process is similar on Android.

Sending an ebook to the Kindle on iOS (Credit: Amazon/PCMag)

Find Your Kindle Email

Amazon also lets you email ebooks to your Kindle account via a specially crafted email address. To find your Kindle’s email address, go to amazon.com/myk on the web (or Account & Lists > Content Library > Devices). Find the relevant Kindle device, click it, and select your ereader.

(Credit: Amazon/PCMag)

On the next page, you’ll find a Device Summary that lists your @kindle.com email address. (It’s set to a default address, but you can change it by clicking Edit.) 

(Credit: Amazon/PCMag)

Back up top, click the Preferences tab and scroll down to Approved Personal Document E-mail List. The email attached to your Amazon account should be listed here. If that’s the email address you’ll be using to send ebooks to your Kindle, you’re all set. To use a different email, click Add a new e-mail address and enter the one you want to use.

Send a PDF to Your Kindle

Amazon can automatically convert PDFs into the Kindle format, but you get two formatting choices. If I want my Kindle to display every page in the PDF as if it were a graphic, I can just email the file to my Kindle’s address (without a subject line), upload it via Send to Kindle, or drag and drop the file onto my Kindle if it’s attached to my PC with a USB cable. It’ll appear on my Kindle like it would on a laptop, maintaining the formatting and graphics, though the font size may be too small to read.

Your other option is to attach the PDF file to an email, and make the subject line “convert”—just that word. If I send it to my Kindle email address, the file will be converted into a Kindle version that will let me mark it up and change the formatting. The graphics will still be in there, though you’ll lose the layout of the original PDF.

An unaltered PDF (left) and converted PDF (right) on the Kindle (Credit: Amazon/PCMag)

Where Do My Ebooks Show Up?

Once you’ve emailed a book, go Home > From Your Library on your Kindle. It might take a few minutes, but it should update automatically and the ebook will appear—as long as you’re connected to Wi-Fi. Want to get rid of the ebook? Tap the three dots on the bottom right of your ebook in Your Library and select Remove download to remove it from your Kindle or Permanently Delete to remove it from your Amazon account.

About Our Expert

Chloe Albanesius

Executive Editor, News

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Experience

I started out covering tech policy in DC for The National Journal, where my beat included state-level tech news and all the congressional hearings and FCC meetings I could handle. I later covered Wall Street trading tech before switching gears to consumer tech. I now lead PCMag’s news coverage.

Getting my start in DC means I still have a soft spot for tech policy; Congressional hearings can sometimes be as entertaining as a Bravo reality show, for better or worse. But PCMag is all about the technology we use every day, as well as keeping an eye out for the trends that will shape the industry in the years ahead (or flop on arrival). I’ve covered the rise of social media, the iOS vs. Android wars, the cord-cutting revolution that’s now left us with hefty streaming bills, and the effort to stuff artificial intelligence into every product you could imagine. This job has taken me to CES in Vegas (one too many times), IFA in Berlin, and MWC in Barcelona. I also drove a Tesla 1,000 miles out west as part of our Best Mobile Networks project. Of late, my focus is on our hard-working team of reporters at PCMag, guiding and editing their robust coverage.

Latest By Chloe Albanesius

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If you’re buying an iPhone directly from Apple, there’s a new policy change you need to be aware of: the company now locks all carrier-financed devices to their respective carriers.

The change, spotted by a Reddit user in Apple’s FAQs for the iPhone 17 Pro, primarily affects customers who are used to having their iPhones financed by T-Mobile and Verizon.

Apple partners with all three major US carriers for payment plans. While devices financed through AT&T were already carrier-locked, those financed through Verizon and T-Mobile came unlocked. This allowed many customers to take advantage of Verizon and T-Mobile’s trade-in values and promotional discounts without limiting their phones to a single carrier.

That loophole has now been closed, and Apple has standardized its policy for all carrier partners. “If you choose to finance an iPhone through the AT&T Installment Plan, T-Mobile Equipment Installment Plan, or Verizon Device Payment Program, your iPhone will be locked to the carrier until paid in full,” the company says on its online store.

It is unclear when the rule was changed and why. However, as MacRumors notes, locking carrier-financed phones is a standard market practice meant to discourage customers from reselling their phones before the balances are paid off.

(Credit: Apple/PCMag)

We reached out to Apple to learn more and will update the story if they respond. According to MacRumors, Apple’s checkout page still offers unlocked iPhones with Verizon (above) and T-Mobile, so the policy may not have taken effect yet. In any case, you can still buy unlocked iPhones through Apple or third-party resellers. Just avoid carrier-financed plans.

About Our Expert

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Experience

Jibin is a tech news writer based out of Ahmedabad, India. Previously, he served as the editor of iGeeksBlog and is a self-proclaimed tech enthusiast who loves breaking down complex information for a broader audience.

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OpenAI has been tight-lipped about the AI hardware it’s building with former Apple design chief Jony Ive, but a new leak reveals their first product could be a smart home speaker.

The speaker is reportedly designed to work as an AI companion at home. In addition to querying, the speaker could be used to control smart home appliances, play music, respond to messages, and support a range of other ChatGPT capabilities, Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports.

Sources describe the device as “mobile” and “screen-free,” suggesting most operations would be voice-based. This would also make the rumored product a competitor to Alexa, Siri, and Gemini-based smart speakers from Amazon, Apple, and Google, respectively.

OpenAI hopes to stand out by positioning its AI as an expert on matters and equipping it with a personality that can customize its responses and connect with the user on a human level, the report adds. The speaker is likely to use ChatGPT’s new GPT-Live voice model. Barring any legal hurdles, OpenAI could unveil the device this year and begin shipping it to users in 2027, Bloomberg says.

Apple has been rumored to be developing AI-powered smart home devices. Bloomberg’s report arrives after the iPhone-maker sued OpenAI for allegedly stealing its trade secrets. The lawsuit claims that after acquiring Ive’s io Products, OpenAI poached Apple employees or pressured them to divulge their work during job interviews

The complaint primarily targets Tang Yew Tan and Chang Liu, two former Apple employees who have now joined OpenAI. Tan is OpenAI’s current hardware chief, and he has been accused of conducting these interviews. Liu, meanwhile, has been accused of failing to return an Apple-issued laptop and exploiting a software bug to gain unauthorized access to Apple’s systems.

Disclosure: Ziff Davis, PCMag’s parent company, filed a lawsuit against OpenAI in April 2025, alleging it infringed Ziff Davis copyrights in training and operating its AI systems.

About Our Expert

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Experience

Jibin is a tech news writer based out of Ahmedabad, India. Previously, he served as the editor of iGeeksBlog and is a self-proclaimed tech enthusiast who loves breaking down complex information for a broader audience.

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