Swedish Siri tests point to upcoming HomePod mini release in Sweden

Apple has been trialling Siri on the HomePod mini in Swedish, a test that may indicate an expansion of availability into Sweden and other countries could occur within months.

Months after its original launch, Apple expanded the HomePod mini's availability into more countries in June 2021. Half a year later, it appears that Apple could be preparing another expansion in early 2022.

So far, the HomePod mini hasn't officially launched in Sweden, and so Siri doesn't truly support Swedish on the compact speaker. According to multiple sources of Macradion, Swedish is being tested on the HomePod mini.

According to the report, a third party sent the HomePod mini out to selected testers, who then test out Siri's Swedish capabilities by saying various phrases. So far, the testing has gone on for eight weeks, but it seems that much more work is needed.

Testers told of how Siri couldn't answer relatively simple queries in Swedish. It is reckoned that it could take a few more months of work before it becomes usable by the public.

The testing of Siri in Swedish on the HomePod mini certainly points to an eventual release in Sweden, and increases the chance of an expansion announced during an early Apple Event.

Sweden probably isn't going to be the only country to enjoy a HomePod mini release, if it occurs. The June launch brought the HomePod mini to Australia, Ireland, and New Zealand at roughly the same time.

In HomePod software 15.2 released in December, Apple added support for a number of languages covering Belgium, the Netherlands, Russia, and Switzerland, despite the HomePod mini not actively being sold in those countries. It is probable that the four, as well as Sweden, will make up part of the next wave of countries that can buy the speaker.

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7 Comments

dope_ahmine

said about 2 years ago

Who in Sweden speaks Swedish with Siri anyway — except perhaps people older than 70 or so. Can’t imagine they are Apple’s prime target for the HomePod mini. Has Apple even done any real-world market research here?

Either way, it’s kinda late to enter this market now when the real (OG) HomePod is gone. The difference in sound quality is tremendous. Imho, I think the minis sound like cheap crap. But on the other hand, I was looking for good quality speakers so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.

modr

said about 2 years ago

I use mine for timeing in the kitchen a lot and it would be great to have it in the scandinavian languages. After all - Siri is named after a Norwegian woman.

Scandinavia is a mature and wealthy marked and we have had SIri on iOS devices for years, so it is a little strange that Swedish, Norwegian and Danish still isn't here.

zanoii

said about 2 years ago

dope_ahmine said:

Who in Sweden speaks Swedish with Siri anyway — except perhaps people older than 70 or so. Can’t imagine they are Apple’s prime target for the HomePod mini. Has Apple even done any real-world market research here?

Either way, it’s kinda late to enter this market now when the real (OG) HomePod is gone. The difference in sound quality is tremendous. Imho, I think the minis sound like cheap crap. But on the other hand, I was looking for good quality speakers so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.

The problem with Siri not being available in your non-native language on the HomePod is that you have to choose between:
Use English with the Homepod and Swedish with your iPhone. This option will not allow you to ask the HomePod questions about your personal stuff, like calendar.
Use English on both HomePod and iPhone. This will enable personal requests like your agenda on the HomePod, but will prevent you from dictating text messages in Swedish (for example with Siri Eyes Free in Carplay) and when using Siri to call people you will have to figure out how an English-speaking person would pronounce their name.

Having Siri set to a non-native language will limit its usability tremendously.

MacsWithPenguins

said about 2 years ago

dope_ahmine said:

Who in Sweden speaks Swedish with Siri anyway — except perhaps people older than 70 or so. Can’t imagine they are Apple’s prime target for the HomePod mini. Has Apple even done any real-world market research here?

Either way, it’s kinda late to enter this market now when the real (OG) HomePod is gone. The difference in sound quality is tremendous. Imho, I think the minis sound like cheap crap. But on the other hand, I was looking for good quality speakers so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.

”People older than 70 or so”. Well, that’s a very specific age. I’m not even 40 yet, I’m fluent in English and consider it my second mother tongue after 30 years of speaking it, and the 2nd language overall, of the 4 languages I can speak in any sense of the word ”speak” (Swedish, English, German and Japanese), where Japanese is just for fun and without knowing everyday Kanji. I could not even read a newspaper as things are right now.

Anyway, the point is, Siri has been available in Swedish for more than 6 and a half years. Of course we speak Swedish with Siri! If you were speaking English to Siri in the early days of the iPhone 4S, or tried Swedish with bad results on the iPhone 6S in 2015, you should know it’s vastly improved since. Siri itself globally, needs substantial improvement in terms of capabilities, but that’s another sub topic.

What I believe you were trying to say, is that Siri does not always understand your dialect or you have trouble with announcing English-pronounced movies and songs for Apple services when Siri is set to Swedish (I do struggle with that from time to time, but it does work if you are willing to retry a few times. Apple needs to work harder in this regard, but I think their investment in CoreML for machine learning will improve things eventually, if people are willing to opt in to sharing anonymous voice data), English in search engine searches, etc, but if you are having problems, you should know Apple made sure Siri works for as many dialects as possible. Even in skånska, which is great news. To the 99.9 % of forum readers here: skånska is the dialect in the southern region of Sweden called Scania. For historical reasons, it’s a blend of Swedish and Danish. At certain times in history, Scania belonged to Denmark. Fast-forward war conflicts, and since the late 1600s, Scania is no longer Danish. All this influenced the dialect (and their continued relations with Denmark, like people living close to the border having jobs in their nearby country) so much that, these days in the digital age, I know Apple trained Siri specifically for skånska, because I remember seeing job postings years ago where they hired Scanian-speaking people.

If you want to see MacWorld Sweden challenge Siri several years ago (without today’s multiple years of improvements and natural speech), here’s a link:

https://macworld.idg.se/2.1038/1.611803/vi-utmanar-apple-siri---klarar-hon-svenska-dialekter
Google-translated for English speakers:
https://macworld-idg-se.translate.goog/2.1038/1.611803/vi-utmanar-apple-siri---klarar-hon-svenska-dialekter?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=sv

dope_ahmine

said about 2 years ago

Ok, jag erkänner att det är fördelaktigt att ha Siri på svenska om man tar diktamen, tex för ett textmeddelande. Men för rena kommandon vet de flesta svenskar knappt vad begreppen heter på svenska. Folk säger ju ”mood” tom på svenska. Ingen fattar vad Apple menar då de snackar om stämningar i Apple Music. När det gäller att tala med Siri via Homepods är det nog mest kommandon det handlar om, och därmed engelska som gäller.

English:
Ok, I admit it is an advantage having Siri in Swedish if you are dictating, for example for a text message. But for pure commands, most Swedes hardly know what the terms are called in Swedish anyway. People say "mood" even in Swedish. Nobody understands what Apple means when they talk about ”stämningar” in Apple Music. When it comes to talking to Siri via Homepods, it's probably most commands that matter, and thus English.