OpenAI’s new AI smart speaker will reportedly sell for between $300 and $400

New details are leaking out about OpenAI's long-rumored hardware device, and the picture getting painted is stranger than expected. Bloomberg reports the gadget will be donut-shaped, built from premium metal, and portable enough to move between a nightstand and a kitchen counter. It's being pitched as the physical embodiment of ChatGPT, a device meant to weave the assistant deeper into daily routines rather than confine it to a phone screen.

The price tag is the part raising eyebrows. Sources tell Bloomberg the device could run $300 to $400, a steep jump from Amazon's Echo lineup, which spans roughly $40 to $240 depending on the model. Add in sources describing unspecified moving parts on the thing, and you get a product that sounds less like a speaker and more like a sculpture that happens to talk back.

OpenAI isn't building this alone. The project involves LoveFrom, the design studio Jony Ive started after leaving Apple, and a 2027 release window is the current expectation according to Bloomberg's reporting. That pedigree explains the emphasis on premium materials and industrial design, but it also raises the stakes: smart speakers have historically struggled to turn a profit even at much lower price points, and Amazon has spent years selling Echo devices near cost just to get them into homes.

OpenAI's hardware ambitions are also tangled up in litigation. Apple has sued the company, alleging trade secret theft, a claim OpenAI denies. Whatever the merits of that case, it's a reminder that OpenAI is stepping directly into hardware territory that established players like Apple and Amazon have spent a decade optimizing and subsidizing. A donut-shaped speaker with a premium price and moving parts is an odd opening move against that kind of competition.