Image: Apple.
Apple has circled Tuesday, October 13, 2026 for its next announcement, with marketing chief Greg Joswiak posting a teaser on X this morning that pairs the tagline “Welcome home” with a hand-stitched version of the company’s retro rainbow logo.
Joswiak is Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing, and his 17-second clip shows hands embroidering the six-colour Apple logo into a hoop, one stripe at a time, before “Welcome home.” and “October 13” appear underneath. For anyone who hasn’t been following the rumours, that tagline lines up neatly with weeks of reporting that Apple is about to make a serious push into the smart home.
Media invitations went out at the same time, and tech reviewer Marques Brownlee (MKBHD) shared on X reads, “We look forward to welcoming you to an Apple Experience in Tribeca, New York on October 13, 2026 at 9:00 a.m. ET,” which works out to 6 a.m. PT. Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman called it a “Welcome home” product launch in New York.
Apple is calling this an “Apple Experience” rather than a special event or keynote, and its Apple Events page still showed September’s iPhone Duo and iPhone 18 Pro event as of Thursday morning, with no October listing. Apple used the same label for its March 4, 2026 media gatherings in New York, London and Shanghai, which were smaller sessions for press rather than a full show at Apple Park.
The date itself isn’t a surprise to anyone who read our September 30 report, which pointed to October 13 for Apple’s new smart home lineup. According to Bloomberg, that lineup is led by a roughly six-inch home hub built around Siri AI, alongside the first HomePod mini update since 2020 and the first new Apple TV set-top box since 2022.
Gurman says the hub, code-named J490, has a square display that can sit on a counter or mount on a wall, and that it is designed to recognise household members by voice or face so it can show each person their own calendar, messages and notes. The HomePod mini and Apple TV are reportedly keeping their current designs while getting faster chips to run Siri AI, and the HomePod mini is said to be coming in new colours, including green and pink.
We’ve heard that hands-on sessions with the new products are set to take place in New York in the days leading up to the October 13 event, with Apple inviting press before today’s announcement.
Gurman said earlier this week that Apple co-developed a doorbell, thermostat, smart lock and security cameras with LG, all carrying LG branding. The first images of the lock, thermostat and temperature sensor leaked a day later. Those LG products are reportedly running behind Apple’s own hardware, so they may get a preview on October 13 at most.
Are you ready to see what Apple has in store for the home next week?
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