6:38 AM
An Amazon reviewer who claims to work for Apple revealed that the Cupertino-based company is working to add iOS HomeKit integration in the next version of iOS. Although it’s very difficult to verify the identity of the poster, MacRumors claims that the name of the reviewer is the same as the one of an Apple marketing employee, which could be a sign that there is indeed some truth behind his message.
“As I work in marketing for Apple, we test many Smart Home devices, especially for iOS HomeKit integration,” he said in his post.
“Some advice, there are many third party applications, most free, that offer more control and customization(s) with many Smart Home devices. ‘Yonomi’ is a free app that I often use, ‘Home’ is another which cost $14.99. Both offer support for many devices with more added daily (including Amazon ‘Echo’). The next version of iOS due this fall will have a standalone ‘HomeKit’ app as well.”
Apple aiming for the smart home
But even if his claims are false, Apple is anyway expected to go for its own HomeKit app, as the company has already trademarked an app icon that could be used for such a project.
HomeKit was first announced by Apple in September 2014 and it launched as a development framework specifically aimed at app creators and hardware companies that wanted to add support for smart devices in iOS. But with iOS 10, Apple is trying to offer its own app in this regard, thus making smart home control an essential feature of the operating system.
It’s believed that Apple is also working with some device manufacturers for this new feature and some compatible devices with various partners might also be in the works.
Certainly, more information in this regard will be provided by Apple itself at the WWDC conference in June when the company is also expected to offer us a preview of iOS 10.
