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Plaud.AI is the newest company to jump on the AI pin trend with its NotePin, a note-taking AI pin that retails for $10 more than its previous product, the Note, according to TechCrunch.
The Note, a device powered by GPT-4o which clips onto the back of a handset to record phone calls or voice notes and transcribe them, cost $159, with the company selling 200,000 units. The new NotePin will retail for $169, with preorders opening on Wednesday.
The pill-shaped AI pin can be pinned to your chest, strapped onto your wrist, worn as a pendant, or clipped to a bag or strap. A quick tap on the pin starts recording, and Plaud claims the battery is good for up to 20 hours of continuous recording.
Designed to provide a more organic way to note down ideas and words from school, meetings, or everyday life, the NotePin is “more than just an AI device,” according to Nathan Hsu, the company’s CEO and co-founder.
Hsu also claims the device is “reshaping the professional landscape” as an “always-ready business partner” and spoke in a release of the ways the AI pin handled daily tasks, leaving users free to focus on more important things.
There are two plans for users to choose from. A free starter plan gives users up to 300 minutes of transcription a month, while the $79 per year Pro Plan provides up to 1,200 minutes of transcription a month, alongside extra features like audio importing and speaker labels.
AI Pins Haven’t Been a Success Thus Far
Anyone tempted to drop $169 on the NotePin might want to consider how other AI wearables have fared in the market, most notably Humane’s AI Pin, which began shipping in April of this year.
While Humane’s iteration was designed as more of a phone without a screen, it cost a fair sight more at $699 plus a $24 per month subscription. Upon release, the wearable received shocking reviews from publications like The Verge, who called it “so thoroughly unfinished and so totally broken in so many unacceptable ways.”
David Pierce’s review for The Verge said that the pin was unable to set alarms or timers, couldn’t tell you calendar events or add events, and though it could create notes and lists, trying to add new things to those lists later almost always failed.
Even the one truly novel aspect of Humane’s AI Pin, the “laser ink” projector, which projects onto your hand in lieu of a screen, was spoiled by the inability to see it under bright light or in sunny conditions.
The pin reportedly didn’t work half of the time, and even when it did, there were many basic things it simply couldn’t do.
The Verge wasn’t alone in its verdict, either. The New York Times said the AI Pin had “glaring flaws”, while YouTuber Marques Brownlee called it “the new worst product I think I’ve ever reviewed, in its current state.”
That last phrase seems to apply to a lot of the AI pins and wearables on the market right now. Rather than being fully formed products, they instead promise to bring great things in the future. After The Verge’s reviewer described some issues with the Humane AI Pin, the company co-founders said that this was “not the first chapter, but the first page” and spoke of future improvements including software refinements and new features.
It looks like orders for the AI Pin will fall short of Humane’s 100,000 target for the year. By early April, the company had received around 10,000 orders.
It has also faced employee departures, a fire risk associated with the device’s charging case battery, and returns outnumbering sales. In June, following the charging case issues, the company was reportedly exploring a $1 billion sale to HP.
While it’s true that Humane’s Pin and other AI wearables will probably get a lot better in time, it’s not clear they justify their prices today.
The Rabbit R1 Fails to Replace Smartphones
The Rabbit R1 faced similar criticism in reviews at launch. Coming in at the opposite end of the market to Humane’s pin, it costs just $199 and uses a large action model to interpret speech and provide answers to common questions. It doesn’t really do anything you can’t do more quickly and easily on your phone, though.
In a review, Engadget said the Rabbit R1 “fails at almost everything,” noting its appalling battery life that fails to last an entire day, annoying scroll wheel, tiny screen, and AI that often doesn’t work.
Cute design aside, the AI assistant reportedly makes many mistakes. Sometimes it fails to respond completely, and when it does respond it often gives the wrong information entirely, such as weather when asked for local traffic updates. The fact that the AI itself makes mistakes seems to be a common issue across many AI wearables on the market, for now.
The R1 has also faced issues including a security flaw in the device’s code system which could expose users’ data.
AI Wearables For Companionship, Not Productivity
Other AI wearables on the market include Friend, the AI pendant designed to keep you company. From the off its USP differs from Humane’s offering and the Rabbit R1, focusing less on productivity and more on companionship.
Its chatbot will help you brainstorm, give you advice on relationships, and chat to you when you’re lonely. Of course, with a product like this that’s more about vibes than facts, there’s less chance it will get things wrong. Friend will cost $99 with no ongoing subscription fee, with the first 30,000 devices set to ship in January 2025.
So what does this mean for the future of AI wearables? Should you drop $169 on Plaud’s AI Pin when it lands? It’s definitely a more appealing price than Humane’s AI Pin, and since it’s designed to focus on note taking rather than trying to cover a broader range of tasks, it should, theoretically, do that one thing well.
However, AI pins and other wearables are really only a recommended buy right now for those who are prepared to invest in a product’s future and don’t mind waiting for updates and new features that will make them worth the outlay.
