By now, you’ve probably seen the Rabbit R1 — the $199, bright orange, AI-powered companion gadget — all over the internet. It’s been making waves for its retro-inspired design, reasonably approachable price tag (with one colossal asterisk), and its vaunted ability to quickly answer straightforward questions. Unfortunately, you’ve probably also seen almost every reviewer under the sun roasting the Teenage Engineering-designed companion for its limited set of day-one features, app integrations that only work with a healthy dose of luck, and its tendency to get the more complicated queries completely wrong.
So, which version of the Rabbit R1 is real, and which would vanish when put into a magician’s hat? Is it a capable AI companion powered by a cloud-based “Large Action Model,” or is it just specialized hardware for a platform that should be an app (and, in some ways, provably already is)? Let’s find out!