Apple Nudges HomeKit Robot Vacuum Support Rollout to Next Year

Apple has quietly tweaked its Home app webpage to indicate that its upcoming robot vacuum control feature will now arrive in early 2025 rather than later this year, as previously advertised.

Roomba and HomeKit Feature
When support is added, Apple device users will be able to start a robot vacuum via HomeKit automations and scenes, or ask Siri to clean a specific room. Apple says the Home app will support the "core functionality" of robot vacuum cleaners, such as vacuuming, mopping, power control, cleaning mode, and charge status.

Apple said at WWDC in June that the iOS 18 feature would arrive later in 2024 – presumably with iOS 18.2, due this month – but that's apparently no longer the case. Apple tweaked a footnote on the Home app webpage in early November, signaling the delay. When it does arrive, controlling robot vacuums with Siri will initially be available in English (U.S.) only.

Related Roundups: iOS 18, iPadOS 18
Related Forums: iOS 18, iPadOS 18

Popular Stories

iPhone 17 Pro Blue Feature Tighter Crop

iPhone 17 Pro Launching in Three Months With These 12 New Features

Saturday June 14, 2025 5:45 pm PDT by
The iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are three months away, and there are plenty of rumors about the devices. Below, we recap key changes rumored for the iPhone 17 Pro models as of June 2025:Aluminum frame: iPhone 17 Pro models are rumored to have an aluminum frame, whereas the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro models have a titanium frame, and the iPhone X through iPhone 14 Pro have a...
apple watch ultra 2 new black

Apple Watch Ultra 3 Finally Coming After Two-Year Hiatus

Monday June 16, 2025 8:45 am PDT by
Apple will finally deliver the Apple Watch Ultra 3 sometime this year, according to analyst Jeff Pu of GF Securities Hong Kong (via @jukanlosreve). The analyst expects both the Apple Watch Series 11 and Apple Watch Ultra 3 to arrive this year (likely alongside the new iPhone 17 lineup, if previous launches are anything to go by), according to his latest product roadmap shared with...
apple watch ultra snow

6 Features Coming to the Apple Watch Ultra 3

Tuesday February 25, 2025 9:00 am PST by
The Apple Watch Ultra 3 is expected to launch later this year, arriving two years after the previous model with a series of improvements. While no noticeable design changes are expected for the third generation since the company tends to stick with the same Apple Watch design through three generations before changing it, there are a series of internal upgrades on the way. By the time the ...
terminal macos tahoe

Apple's Terminal App Gets Colorful Redesign in macOS Tahoe

Monday June 16, 2025 4:12 am PDT by
Apple's Terminal app is getting a visual refresh in macOS Tahoe, and it's the first notable design update since the command-line tool debuted. The updated Terminal will support 24-bit color and Powerline fonts, according to Apple's State of the Platforms presentation at WWDC25. The app will also adopt the new Liquid Glass aesthetic with redesigned themes that align with macOS 26's broader...
iOS 26 on Three iPhones

Apple Says iOS 26 Won't Be Available on These iPhone Models

Tuesday June 10, 2025 6:58 am PDT by
Apple this week revealed that iOS 26 is compatible with the iPhone 11 series and newer. That means that iOS 18 is the end of the road for the iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, and iPhone XR, which were all released in 2018. However, those devices will continue to receive security updates for at least a few more years. iOS 26 is compatible with the following iPhone models: iPhone 16e iPhone...
new iphone lockscreen ios 26

iOS 26: Five Changes Coming to Your iPhone Lock Screen

Tuesday June 17, 2025 8:46 am PDT by
With iOS 26, Apple has made some additions to the iPhone Lock Screen that aim to make it more customizable than ever. Of course, things can always change before the software makes its way to the general iPhone-owning public, but here are five new things iOS 26 can do on the Lock Screen as of the current developer beta. Widgets Top or Bottom In iOS 18, the row of widgets on your Lock...
iOS 18

Apple Releases iOS 18.6 Public Beta

Wednesday June 18, 2025 10:24 am PDT by
Apple today seeded the first betas of upcoming iOS 18.6 and iPadOS 18.6 updates to public beta testers, with the betas coming just a few days after Apple provided the betas to developers. Testers who have signed up for beta updates through Apple's beta site can download iOS 18.6 and iPadOS 18.6 from the Settings app on a compatible device by going to General > Software Update. When the...

Top Rated Comments

daniesy Avatar
7 months ago
Is anyone surprised? Maybe we need the new iPhone 17 to have this advanced feature.
Score: 21 Votes (Like | Disagree)
cookiemonster89 Avatar
7 months ago
I'm wondering how Apple Keynotes would look like, if they only announce the features ready in time for the .0 release.
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
McWetty Avatar
7 months ago
How much R&D money does Apple allocate to HomeKit development? $3.50 and some happy meals? Seems like a complete non-issue… but here we are.
Score: 13 Votes (Like | Disagree)
insomniac86 Avatar
7 months ago
How is this a complicated thing?

I feel like the entire HomeKit team at Apple is just two part-time workers.

Excluding the UI design work, this shouldn’t take more than a single senior programmer a couple of weeks to do.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
JungleNYC Avatar
7 months ago
I really wish Apple would invest more time and effort into HomeKit. It's such an important piece of the ecosystem, and it just feels so neglected.

It's also something that Apple Intelligence would be very helpful with eventually, helping users craft Scenes and Automations, etc.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
bollman Avatar
7 months ago
This function will surely not suck!







?
Sorry, I'll see myself out
Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)