It’s possible the Humane AI Pin will go down as one of the — if not the — worst-reviewed product launches in modern tech history. Humane, the company started by former Apple executives and designers, first announced its generative-AI powered, screenless wearable in 2023, hyped up to the point where runway models wore them at Paris Fashion Week.
But then reviewers got their hands on them, with results reminiscent of the dumpster fire that was Google’s Nexus Q.
David Pierce said in our own review that absolutely no one should buy it. Marques Brownlee said the AI Pin is “The Worst Product I’ve Ever Reviewed... For Now.” Engadget called it “the solution to none of technology’s problems.” The Washington Post called it “a promising mess you don’t need yet.” Cooling issues, latency issues, and many missing features are only some of the gripes with this $699 plus $24 monthly subscription fee AI pin.
Humane AI claims it will get better with time, but how much time is there for a company that laid off 4 percent of its employees just a few months before the launch? Will it ever be considered worth the asking price? We’ll be keeping tabs, and in the meantime, here’s everything that has happened post-launch.
- Take a look inside the Rabbit R1 and the Humane AI Pin.
I love a good iFixit teardown, and this one is super instructive. You can really see how much more polished and complex the AI Pin is, but both have a lot of tech and design even inside their cases. And if you’re thinking, gosh, there’s a lot of phone-like stuff in here... you’re getting it.
The Humane AI Pin is lost in translation
As funny as it was when the AI Pin utterly failed at translating Korean and Japanese, it also broke my heart. Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The VergeOf all the things the Humane AI Pin promised, I was most intrigued by translation. In a demo, a man speaks to Humane co-founder Imran Chaudhri in Spanish. The AI Pin automatically translates it to English. Chaudhri replies in English. Again, the AI Pin translates his words back into Spanish. There are notable pauses when the AI is processing, but it’s a powerful concept. Unlike with Google Translate, there was solid eye contact between both people. The AI voice sounded more natural and less robotic. And crucially, there were no screens. The language barrier was still there, but it was much more permeable.
That’s not what happened when I tried it myself.
Read Article >- “I only regret that I cannot stare at my phone more hours of the day.”
Katie Notopoulos’ take on the Humane AI pin’s screen-free proposition is a delightful read that’s slightly tongue-in-cheek (she’s the former Editor in Chief of Threads, after all) and completely relatable. I, for one, am thrilled that she’s on team Screens are Good.
- MKBHD calls the Humane AI pin “the worst product I’ve ever reviewed.”
If you thought David Pierce’s review for us was scathing, just wait till you watch Marques Brownlee’s review that just dropped. Yikes.
The good, the bad, and the Humane Pin
Image: Alex Parkin / The VergeSeven. Hundred. Dollars. After a year of asking questions about this much-hyped AI wearable, the Humane AI Pin is here, and, well, we still have lots of questions. We’re also still trying to figure out how it all works — and where it goes from here.
On this episode of The Vergecast, we dive deep into our review of the AI Pin and try to figure out what went wrong with this device and whether there’s a real future for it or any other AI-powered gadget. The trouble, we discover, is that these devices are stacking new technology on top of new technology, and until it all works perfectly, none of it will work very well. Also, did we mention the AI Pin is seven hundred dollars?
Read Article >- I tried asking the Humane AI Pin if it had lunch in Japanese.
I tried getting the pin to translate lyrics to children’s songs in Japanese and Korean. Emphasis on tried.
For the record, the Google Translate app on my phone had zero problems.
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