I was thrilled to see Dio Node recently reviewed by one of the biggest press outlets in the Apple world - AppleInsider! As a new player in the multi-room audio space, it's exciting to be compared to industry giants like Apple's HomePod Mini and find that we still hold our own for things like sound quality and user experience. It's especially rewarding to see Dio Node getting recognized for the things we spent our time perfecting, with AppleInsider highlighting our simplicity, privacy-first design, and clear sound. Overall, I was actually quite excited to see the number of positive things they had to say about our product!
That said, they also raised two main concerns: our price point and lack of stereo pairing - both of which I'd like to address today.
I always appreciate thoughtful feedback, especially from reviewers who give their time and attention to thoroughly test our product. Mindful of that, I wanted to share what I think is an important missing perspective on why Dio Node exists, why it's different, and who it's really for.
Why Dio Node's Pricing Makes Sense
To give some context, the standard rate for Dio Node is roughly $79 per speaker for our popular multi-packs, or $89.95 for just a single speaker. HomePod Mini is $99 per speaker, sold only in singles.
Regardless of how you cut it, Dio Node is actually the cheapest AirPlay-enabled speaker on the market. And I'm not saying that on a technicality: we aren't just $1 lower than the next cheapest option - we're a hefty 20% lower, and that's just our standard multi-pack rate (more on that in a minute). In fact, we even compiled a list a few years ago of all the AirPlay 2 speakers on the market that we could find and posted them on our website, along with their prices, to show exactly where we land. And yes, our closest competitor is the HomePod Mini, which is 25% more expensive (or, you could say, we are 20% cheaper). And how often do you really see 20% off on Apple Products, let alone any major technology products? Even Apple's employee discount isn't that high.
That being said, when you compare a single Dio Node against a single HomePod Mini, I wholeheartedly agree that Dio's pricing is fairly close. At best, you'd save around $20, which here in California would be the price of DoorDashing your dinner for one night. However, we didn't create the world's most affordable AirPlay 2 speaker to save you $20. We did it so that the average household can finally have an accessible option to outfit their entire home with audio. Some of our customers have already purchased 10-15 speakers for their homes at this point, which to-date would have saved them anywhere between $200-$700 compared to HomePod Mini (depending on the sale price of Dio Node at the time of purchase).
And speaking of sales, AppleInsider did make this interesting observation:
A three-pack of Dio Node speakers is currently on sale for $239. At full retail, three HomePod minis come in at just a hair under $300. HomePod minis frequently go on sale for $80, bringing three of them down to $240 also.
This is where there may have been some misunderstanding of our price point. Our $239 price for a 3-Pack is our standard multi-pack price, not a sale price - our multi-packs are always a lower price than the singles. And so the comparison here starts to get a bit unfair, because comparing another product's discount price against our standard price is apples-to-oranges. Not to mention that Apple is notoriously resistant to discounting its products, so I'd wager that there probably never has been nor will be a moment where you find HomePod Mini at a lower price than Dio Node. Next time you see a HomePod Mini on sale, just hop back to our website and check out our offer as well 😉.
Stereo Pairing Limits the Listening Experience
Of course, AppleInsider's point wasn't just that Dio Node's price was too close to HomePod Mini. The main point was that the higher price of HomePod Mini is worth it for having stereo pairing - which I think is a totally fair point depending on what you plan to use AirPlay speakers for.
Before we dive into this, let me give a quick overview of what exactly stereo pairing is. High-end audio tracks are often recorded with two microphones, one that captures the "left" channel and one that captures the "right" - the same way your ears capture sound on the left and right sides of your head and then merge it in your brain as a unified sound. Stereo-paired speakers are a set of two speakers, where one is dedicated to playing the "left" channel and the other is dedicated to the "right". The result is you, sitting in the middle, getting a more natural listening experience.
As you can imagine, only high budget audio tracks are recorded in stereo, which is limited to (1) music and (2) movies. In fact, stereo pairing is a staple of the Home Theater industry in order to give you that theater-like surround sound experience in your home for immersive sound effects and soundtracks. Since you need a dedicated left side and right side of sound, the stereo pairing effect only works if you are planning to stay in one place with your head pointed in one direction (such as watching TV) so that the left speaker always sits on your left side and the right speaker always sits on your right.
Here's the thing, though - Dio Node was never intended to be a home theater system. It doesn't even connect directly to your television. In fact, Dio Node was meant to be bought in packs of 3 or more so that you could have audio in different rooms of your home playing from a smartphone, which is why we sell 3-Packs, 5-Packs, and singles. We created Dio Node to offer a flexible, seamless experience to stay connected to your content anywhere in your home life: while doing laundry, doing dishes, getting ready for the day, exercising - you name it! As a result, we don't expect our users to be limited to one direction that their head is pointed in, or one room for them to be sitting in.
In fact, when you look at the data, you'll see that stereo pairing is an expensive feature that's useful for only a very niche set of uses. Did you know that people's time spent with audio has been growing at roughly 9.5% per year on average, but there's also been a 38% drop in music listening over the last 10 years? The growth in listening has come from content like podcasts, audiobooks, and YouTube videos - which typically do not record as stereo tracks and would therefore be unaffected by stereo-paired speakers.
Ultimately, stereo pairing limits the listening experience, causing you to pay extra for a feature that applies primarily to home theater and requires you to physically stay put in order to use. However, if you're the type of person who does actually just want to set up a home theater system in your home with extended audio in additional rooms, stereo pairing can be worth it. In fact, I'd recommend getting some HomePods for the living room and Dio Nodes for other areas of your home so that you can have the best of both worlds, seeing as we made Dio Node interoperable with HomePods!
The Things You Don't Get With HomePod Mini
Instead of stereo pairing, we focused on offering the most reliable multi-room AirPlay experience on the market, with fewer dropouts, interruptions, or other issues that can be caused by weak or busy Wi-Fi networks, compared even to the HomePod Mini. In fact, we did an audio test together with HomePod Mini on a busy network and found that the HomePod kept dropping off of AirPlay because it couldn't retain the signal while the Dio Nodes continued playing flawlessly (this was part of our testing in creating our software update 1.0.5 that launched in January).
We also optimized Dio Node's sound quality for the things you actually do care about listening to: podcasts, audiobooks, and content. We tuned our EQ to accentuate voices so that you hear your content crisply and clearly even when you're in a noisy environment such as a fan blowing or water running in the background. Compare that to my HomePod Mini (and yes, I do have one!) which totally gets drowned out in these kinds of environments to the point where I can only hear bass (which is pretty useless for my podcasts and audiobooks).
And, of course, it's always worth mentioning that Dio Node has no microphones built-in and doesn't require an app to use. We're an AirPlay-native speaker, which is actually more than can be said for even the HomePod, which requires HomeKit and Siri setup in order to use. For all those places in your home where you don't want an internet-connected device with a microphone listening in, Dio Node is the right speaker for you.
Final Thoughts: Who Dio Node Is Really For
If you've read this far, you've probably gotten a good sense by now of who exactly we built Dio Node for and why we designed the product the way we did. I think, ultimately, that HomePod Mini and Dio Node are two very different products for very different purposes. And the good news is they can actually be used together!
The HomePod Mini is a great basic smart hub for your home that can also double as a decent home theater or musical system, which makes it perfect for the tech enthusiast audiophile. On the other hand, Dio Node was created more practically for the everyday listener - someone who just wants to stay engaged with their audio content as flexibly, seamlessly, and affordably as possible.
For the things that matter - sound quality, reliability, privacy, and multi-room audio that is deeply integrated with your smartphone - Dio Node is as good or better than HomePod Mini. But for techie audiophiles that want a little bit extra in their listening experience without minding the privacy challenges of a smart speaker, HomePod Mini is probably best for you.
At the end of the day, I firmly believe that Dio Node is an extremely vital product that needs to exist. Our product is the backbone of multi-room, AirPlay audio: an affordable option, built for the average home, that actually "just works" without compromising your privacy or imposing restrictions on your listening experience. This is not a space that HomePod Mini is trying to occupy, nor an audience they are trying to cater to.
As I said, however, this really isn't an either-or scenario. At the end of the day, we sell our speakers in multi-packs while Apple sells theirs in singles, which makes one a perfect complement to the other. We have an explicit commitment to not create another locked ecosystem exclusively for our products, so our customers will never be in a position where you have to choose one over the other.
If you're interested in checking out Dio Node, you can do so here.