OpenAI's $300 doughnut speaker wants a seat at the smart home table 🍩

OpenAI's first consumer device will be a screenless, doughnut-shaped smart speaker roughly the size of a hockey puck, with pricing discussed at $300 to $400 per unit, according to a Bloomberg report on Thursday citing people familiar with the matter. The battery-powered speaker is designed to be carried around the home in one hand and used in different positions, whether held or set on a surface, and includes speaker grilles, microphones, indicator lights, a camera and sensors that relay information about the surroundings to the underlying AI. Parts of the circular casing are intended to move on their own to signal when the device is responding, an effort to make the object feel more interactive than stationary competitors in a market where Amazon and Google dominate.

OpenAI is positioning the product as a computer built around AI, with functionality similar to ChatGPT's voice mode backed by more advanced models. The hardware was designed with Jony Ive's LoveFrom studio and will use upscale materials including high-quality metal. OpenAI bought Ive's device startup io for $6.4 billion in May 2025, and Decrypt reported in April that the company is separately co-developing a smartphone chip with Qualcomm and MediaTek.

The launch plans are unfolding against a lawsuit filed by Ive's former employer Apple in July in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California over the alleged misappropriation of hardware trade secrets, naming former Apple engineer Chang Liu, former design executive Tang Yew Tan and io Products. Apple's complaint cites a metal finishing technique it says OpenAI asked a longtime Apple supplier to develop for an upcoming product, though whether that refers to the speaker, a different device or a scrapped concept is unclear, according to Bloomberg. OpenAI denies the claims. In a blog post on Monday, the company called the suit "careless, aggressive and oddly personal," said Apple had confused two employees with similar surnames, and published emails and texts it says undercut the allegations. OpenAI filed a motion to dismiss late Wednesday, while Apple has also sought a preliminary injunction that could restrict OpenAI during the case.

OpenAI has aimed to unveil the speaker this year and ship it in 2027, and is pressing ahead internally, though a representative declined to comment on product plans to Bloomberg. Public reception to OpenAI's broader push of AI into the home has been mixed, with a recent post by CEO Sam Altman highlighting a "cool use case" for its ChatGPT Work agent that connected family calendars to generate a school-run podcast about one child's soccer game and another's birthday drawing more critical replies than likes, Fortune reported.