Can HomePod Have Multiple Users?

Clean design, exceptional sound quality and the capacity to control smart gadgets in your smart home via voice commands are just few of the strong suits of Apple’s HomePod.

And I have been receiving so many queries regarding HomePod from my readers regarding HomePod and its features.

So, I figured while I am in this zone of answering smart home and smart gadgets related queries.

Why not throw some queries associated with HomePods into the mix, looking at the frequency by which I am receiving these queries.

So, in this quick and informative article let me cover topics associating HomePod and its user access.

Particularly queries like does homepod work with multiple users and if it can how can you set up your HomePod for access by multiple users.

Well, one can understand the interest given, HomePod’s seamless integration within the iOS ecosystem and the capacity to be able to deploy it to a whole spectrum of application.

So, let’s start our discussion with,

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The answer is yes, HomePods can infact be accessed by multiple users and there will be certain steps you will have to follow (described below) to be able to do so. Once you have taken the necessary steps, you will be able to control your smart gadgets, make voice commands through various distributed centres or users.

HomePods are actually designed to accommodate multiple users into its domain.

And the reasoning should be pretty obvious given in a smart home operating on voice commands, allowing just one person to control everything is seems pretty illogical.

Now of course, one direct question that pops up in each of our minds of course is, what about privacy and security?

Will different users have the option to control what data they wish to share with others using the device?

The answer to that is again yes, you will be able to choose what information you wish to share or keep private from others using the device.

Now that we have established that you can infact have multiple users on your HomePod.

Let’s learn how exactly can you set up multile users on your HomePod.

How To Set Up Multiple Users On Your HomePod?

As mentioned at the starting of this post, the HomePod is manufactured to include multiple users in its domain of operations.

And setting it up to actually incorporate multiple users is fairly simple, though you will need to carry out some preliminary steps.

Here is how you go about setting up multiple users on your HomePod.

First, things first you will have to tell HomePod what users should it welcome aboard so to speak.

You do that by inviting them first.

Inviting users in order to access playback controls and other HomePod features is fairly simple.

In the Home App of your favorite iOS device open “Home“.
Once inside, tap on the “Home Settings” icon on the top left of your screen and then tap “Invite”.
On tapping invite you will be shown the Apple ID info of the user you wish to invite.
After that just tap on “Send Invite” to send the invitation to welcome aboard the user with the shown Apple ID.

Once you have completed the 4-step invitation process, the invited users will have to accept the invitation.

In order to do that every invited user will have to go into the “Home Settings” option of their Home App.

Very similar to what we did when sending the invite and click on “Accept“.

Once the invitation is accepted you will then be added into the ecosystem of the HomePod.

Using Voice Recognition When There Are Mutiple Users

The question that automatically follows after we have addressed “can HomePod have multiple users” is “how to use Siri voice recognition when having multiple users onto the HomePod“.

An apt question of course and I feel this is the perfect time to address it.

The HomePod is technologically equipped to handle and differentiate between multiple voice inputs from multiple users.

In order for HomePod to recognize your voice, the “Recognize My Voice” feature will enable you help Siri recognize your voice and create your voice specific library in its database.

Once that is done, Siri will be able to learn your voice pattern to respond to your queries, access your personal music library and of course control various smart gadgets in the ecosystem dictated by the HomePod.

It is important here to note here that up to 6 users can be managed concurrently on a HomePod in a household with voice recognition.

However, even if you invite more than 6 users onto your HomePod’s ecosystem, you will still be able to do basic tasks using Siri like playing music.

With the very way, voice recognition and AI is progressing one very important area of concern that arises, particularly when a lot of user data is being accessed is that of privacy.

When it comes to privacy, I think there is no better area of technology that can be regarded as grey. It always seems and it has been true to an extent with the happening in the recent past that something is always happening in the background that users aren’t aware of.

So, of course, in this situation where multiple user data is being stored, accessed and executed what about Privacy.

Will multiple users in the HomePod ecosystem be able to control the data they wish to share or keep private?

Can users control what content and data is and isn’t accessed by the HomePod?

Let’s find out.

How To Control Data Access On A HomePod With Multiple Users

As mentioned in the previous section of this post, people have been having a sceptic outlook towards smart devices from the get go.

What’s your creepy Alexa/google home story? from AskReddit

Therefore, the increasing demand and concern as to how the data is being accessed by smart devices (especially those who seem to be able to make decisions and think for themselves) can be understood.

And of course, for these reasons, companies using AI, machine learning and other advanced tech are always on their toes when it comes to privacy.

And that’s why you see these big tech giants creating elaborate privacy policies and making you aware as to what they are.

Whether you understand them or not or have the time to read them is a different question altogether.

Who do you think that works in the favour of? Food for thought isn’t it?

Anyways, this topic of Privacy Policy in tech is a subject of an elaborate discussing worthy of a few separate posts.

Let’s bring our discussion back to HomePods.

Thankfully, with HomePods, restricting and granting access is just as simple as inviting users into its ecosystem.

This is how you can keep the sensitive information private when you have multiple users in the HomePod domain.

Securing Personal Requests

If you are an experienced iOS user you must be aware of the helpfulness of personal requests.

With personal requests you can add and remove reminders, alarms, calendar events, access messages, make notes and so much more.

You can even different shortcuts for Siri using personal requests from your iOS device of choice.

One very important step you can take in controlling what can be accessed is by choosing which HomePod speakers are to respond to Personal requests.

However, if you are using just one HomePod speaker in your household, the presence of multiple users on to its domain may mean other users may have potential access to sensitive data.

Although you can request for authorization request for personal requests but with that you will only be able to restrict access to notes.

But don’t worry you can actually have greater access to securing your sensitive data in your interconnected domain.

All you need to do is follow these simple steps.

In the Home App of your favorite iOS device tap “Home“.
Under the Home Settings, open your avatar under “People“.
Toggle the “Personal Requests” Off.

What you can also do is request authentication by leaving the toggle “On” and tapping on “Require Authentication” and then tapping “For Secure Requests“.

This will ensure that anyone who is requesting to access features of the HomePod goes through a layer of security.

Restricting Merge Of User Recommendations

In Apple Music you continuously receive new feeds of music depending on what you like.

Of course, your taste in music is going to be different than other users who are sharing your HomePod.

And therefore, you wouldn’t want your recommendations by Apple Music get intermingled with music preference of other people.

In order for that to not happen once again open the Home App.

Once you have opened the home app, find the HomePod icon and then press and hold it till you see the little pop-up menu.

In the popup menu go ahead and click “Details”.

In the menu that gets shown subsequently toggle the Use Listening History to Off.

Once you have done that, every user onto the HomePod will be able to listen to the music they request without worrying about their personal music preference getting mixed with the collective music pool.

Conclusion,

With that we are at the end of this quick tutorial and discussion section where in addition to receiving answers to the queries like can HomePod have multiple users we also looked into learning how exactly can you have multiple users setup on your HomePod?

In addition, to the premium quality sound and the smart home control that HomePod offers, the capacity to be able to add multiple users is a big selling point for Apple.

And the manufacturing process in conjugation with software that allows you to add that layer of privacy and security just makes the whole experience better.

If you have any other questions, comments or feedbacks leave them down below in the comments section.

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Helpful topics likes these is what this blog is filled with.

BBye!

Can HomePod Have Multiple Users? | HomePod User Control