TP-Link brings an AI assistant to its smart home and home networking apps

Tapo, the smart home brand owned by networking giant TP-Link, is launching an AI assistant at CES this year — because isn’t everyone?

Aireal is designed to “bring AI into real life” (geddit?), according to the company, and will help you “understand your home, quickly fix Wi-Fi issues and control your devices using natural language.” The assistant will work across TP-Link’s smart home products and Wi-Fi networking devices and will live in the Tapo and Deco apps.

This should allow you to use natural language (via dictation in the app) to create new smart home routines or control devices by describing what you want to happen. For example, “Start vacuuming after I leave the house.” You can also ask questions such as “Why is this device offline?” and get troubleshooting help.

Aireal is also coming to Tapo’s security cameras, and the company says this will enable AI-generated text descriptions of what your camera captured, rather than just a vague alert saying “pet detected.” It can also merge repeated alerts to reduce notification fatigue and let you search your footage with a few words to find what you need, such as: “Show me the package that arrived yesterday.”

Aireal brings facial recognition to Tapo cameras for the first time. If you enable the new feature, you can be alerted when your camera detects someone, along with who that person is. The company says the facial ID info is stored in the cloud, encrypted, and transmitted securely.

Aireal will launch in an early access program on January 6 on select products, including Tapo’s newest security cameras debuting at CES this week: the Tapo C645D Kit (a solar-powered 2K dual-lens pan/tilt cam), Tapo C465 (a 4K battery-powered camera), and Tapo C710 (a 2K pan/tilt hardwired floodlight camera).

Aireal will get a wider rollout in the US later this year. There will be a subscription fee to use the assistant, but the company says pricing hasn’t been determined.