OpenAI and Jony Ive's Screenless AI Device Could Release in the Next Two Years
Sam Altman and Jony Ive confirmed that the product has received its first prototype.
Summary
- Sam Altman and Jony Ive have moved their screenless, pocketable AI hardware from concept to prototype, expecting a debut in less than two years
- The “third core device” is designed around ambient intelligence, aiming to filter digital noise instead of amplifying it
- Ive’s design language focuses on deceptive simplicity and whimsy, defining the new AI-native interface
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and legendary Apple designer Jony Ive have quietly moved their mysterious AI hardware from concept to prototype, confirming that “finally, we have the first prototypes” and that the debut device should arrive in less than two years.
The product is widely understood as a screenless, pocketable AI gadget born from OpenAI’s $6.4 billion USD acquisition of Ive’s io Products, pitched as a “third core device” that lives alongside, not inside, your phone and laptop. Altman describes today’s iPhone era as like walking through Times Square, with flashing notifications and dopamine-chasing apps, while the new device aims for a vibe closer to “sitting in the most beautiful cabin by a lake,” filtering digital noise instead of amplifying it.
The hardware is designed around ambient intelligence. It should build deep contextual awareness of your life, decide the right moment to surface information, and otherwise disappear into the background as AI does most of the work.
Ive’s design language leans into deceptive simplicity and whimsy. He talks about solutions that “teeter on appearing almost naive in their simplicity,” and Altman says the final object is “simple and beautiful and playful.” The duo even joke about a “lick or bite” test for the hardware, insisting you should want to touch it, carry it, almost use it without thought, signalling an object that belongs as much to fashion and lifestyle as to traditional consumer tech.
Strategically, the device is OpenAI’s bid to escape living on other companies’ glass slabs and to define what an AI-native interface looks like before Apple, Google, or Meta lock in the next era of everyday computing.
