Apple's second-generation HomePod carries over the elegant design from the original, but improves the audio and smart home experiences to better compete with speakers from Amazon and Google.

A pair of HomePods make a formidable home entertainment powerhouse.

Fantastic sound, immersive Spatial Audio and the ability to fill a room with ease – the HomePod 2 is a wonderful smart speaker, but only if you’re deep in the Apple ecosystem.

The HomePod 2 isn’t meant for critical, analytical listening. Instead, it performs best with fun, bassy, energetic music that can really showcase the speaker’s strengths. Best of all, though, is the convenience afforded by this product when you integrate one or more into a smart home setup with other Apple products – in this context, it is unmatched.

The HomePod (2nd generation) is hands down smarter and boomier than its predecessor, making it worth considering for an upgrade. It’s also a worthy contender for a replacement to a soundbar (if you splash for two it’ll sound even better), but another use case is if you’re yet to fully dive into a smart home speaker experience and you use an iPhone. It’s a smart device that sounds fantastic, works incredible alongside other Apple devices and is let down only by its price. But, given the first generation HomePod came out six years ago, this new one should also last you well into the future.

The HomePod (2nd generation) is an amazing-sounding speaker with Dolby Atmos and improved smart home features. Its potential is hobbled by Siri and the lack of support outside of the Apple universe, but for Apple users who can accept its limitations, the new HomePod won't disappoint.

The new HomePod is hands-down the best smart speaker for Apple users. Its exceptional sound quality, ease of use, and vast smart home capabilities are worth pressing the buy button, especially if you have already bought into the Apple universe.

As with the previous version, the new second-generation HomePod is aimed at buyers with very specific needs, and it's best suited for smart speaker shoppers who fall into these categories: You're an avid Apple user for most devices and services, and a Siri fan. You care a lot about sound, with a penchant for 3D audio formats. You're looking to build out a HomeKit-based smart home and/or an intuitive home theater system with a new Apple TV 4K. If you find some of those scenarios don't readily apply, and you just want a solid smart speaker, you'd likely do just as well with a smaller HomePod Mini, or one of the many cheaper alternatives from Google, Amazon, and Sonos, like an Echo Studio or Sonos One. If you do check most of those boxes — and especially if you're interested in buying two speakers to create a Siri-powered stereo system — the new HomePod is a good buy for any Apple-centric smart home or entertainment center.

Apple has been preparing for a new HomePod for five years, constantly improving both the original version and the HomePod mini. And the fact that the company has made Siri a more capable companion certainly helps. Plus, there’s more smart home abilities than before. Apple hasn’t strayed from its emphasis on the spoken (or sung) word for HomePod’s sound profile, but that’s okay. It’s clear that the company is focused on expanding the toolbox for its smart speakers after their debut, so I’d expect that much like the original HomePod, this is just the beginning for the second generation.

It's too expensive to be anyone's first foray into Apple's smart home ecosystem, but if you want to add bigger and better sound to your burgeoning high-tech home, the Apple HomePod (2nd Generation) could be just the thing. Just don't bother if you're not already all the way in on Apple's hardware and software.

The HomePod 2 creates a nuanced spatial audio experience that sounds great everywhere in your home. It’s also expandable to be the center of your home theater for movies and games with some additional hardware purchases.

The Apple HomePod 2 delivers amazing sound quality, and works incredibly well within Apple’s ecosystem — such as with the Apple TV 4K. However, it’s much more expensive than our favorite smart speaker, the Sonos One, which works with Alexa and Google Assistant.

If you have an iPhone and plan on staying in Apple’s ecosystem then a HomePod (or two) is a sound investment for various home audio needs, serving music and TV setups well.

The second-gen HomePod is a great pick for Apple users who don't already own the previous model, offering lots of smarts and room-filling sound for a good price. The new version updates support for smart home devices, includes new sensors and features, and costs less than the original.

Overall the HomePod sounds great, but its high price and Apple-centric features simply exclude too many potential users -- including Spotify subscribers and Android owners -- for broad appeal. And for Apple fans who want a Siri speaker, the Mini is probably big enough.

The HomePod 2 offers clear, detailed and well-balanced sound from an impressively compact package – but it requires you to run an extremely Apple-heavy household, due to its lack of Bluetooth. The new Matter smart home support and temperature/humidity sensors are nice to have, but aren't much of a push to buy on their own. And Siri isn't much of a smart assistant, even today. That's a lot of criticisms, but if you're the target market – music lovers who go big on Apple devices – nothing else sounds as good for the same price, especially if you step up to a pair of them.

The HomePod is a great investment for Apple users who want a great smart speaker that plays nicely with their smart home devices. Though you'd probably want to buy two HomePods to maximize your listening experience, especially for live sports and blockbuster movies.

The first HomePod sounded great, but was limited in some of the smart aspects. At the time, I figured this was less important, as that can be upgraded on Apple’s servers, but the audio hardware wouldn’t change. Now, with a faster processor to future-proof it for what it needs to do on-device, Apple has improved the audio capabilities. The result is the best-sounding smart speaker—again.

The Apple HomePod remains an excellent home speaker – with some of the best sound quality at this price point. It’s still only an option for all-Apple households, and paired up with an Apple TV, it can do wonderful things. But in true Apple style, you do things its way or the highway in terms of the services you use. From a smart home perspective, however, Siri still lags as a voice controller, but it gets the job done with only occasional frustrations. Matter should open up a new world of options for Apple-centric smart homes, and could be the beginning of a new era.

The second-gen HomePod is an all-round improvement and once again sounds brilliant. But Siri still lags behind and rivals are plentiful.

The return of the full-sized HomePod is, without a doubt, a good thing. When Apple discontinued the original HomePod, it was a bummer — I think a lot of people didn't realize how good it was or how much they liked it until they couldn't get it anymore. The fact that the second-generation HomePod is a bit more affordable than the original HomePod solves probably its biggest barrier of entry.

Apple's second-generation HomePod is an excellent smart speaker for anyone already invested in Apple's ecosystem — including Apple Music.

The Apple HomePod 2 is decent for music. Like most premium devices on the market, it has a room correction tool that automatically adjusts its output based on your room's unique acoustic characteristics. Voices and lead instruments are clear and present in the mix, with a touch of extra brightness in the treble. It can reproduce a more extended low-bass than its predecessor, which is great for fans of bass-heavy music like EDM and hip-hop. That said, you can't customize its sound, which is disappointing if you want a different sound.

If you’re deep in the Apple ecosystem and your Wi-Fi signal and frustration threshold are both strong, this is the smart speaker for you: it will play your music beautifully and make TV watching a delight. Just be prepared to repeat yourself, and listen to a bunch of songs you never asked for.

Apple might call the second-gen HomePod “all-new,” but in reality, this product had to be an easy lift for the company. More than anything else, its restoration in the lineup fills a self-inflicted gap and buys Apple a couple of years to work on more ambitious products destined for our homes. But with competitors like Sonos planning major new products for the coming months, I can’t help but wonder whether Apple played it too safe with this $299 speaker — no matter how good it may sound.

Apple’s second-generation HomePod is an improvement over the first and it costs less, but it will only be of interest to iOS users. Even then, it’s not the strongest smart home hub, nor is it the best speaker for music and movies in its price class.

The new HomePod is a very safe upgrade from Apple, but doesn't do much to justify its $300 price tag. $249 sounds like a better price tag for the big HomePod as-is, especially with new competition from Sonos on the horizon. We'll be talking more about how it compares to alternatives in the coming weeks.

The other candidate for this HomePod is someone who's dabbled around with the HomePod mini and likes what it offers but wants something more substantial and capable of more volume and bass. It got loud and thumped, usually without breaking a sweat. Unfortunately, it just isn't the best value because of its high price.

The new HomePod is a great-sounding smart speaker made even better – it’s an irresistible choice if you’re an Apple user

Apple's new HomePod is so good, I can't quite believe how much the company has improved the sound signature over the original.

The second-generation HomePod provides jaw-dropping audio, whether listening to music or watching films through the Apple TV, and it only gets better with two of them. If you've already bought into the Apple ecosystem, this provides a premium experience all-round.