The Rabbit R1 is a “pocket companion” designed by the US startup Rabbit in collaboration with the technology company Teenage Engineering. It aims to disrupt the dominance of smartphones in our lives by using artificial intelligence to complete tasks. The Rabbit R1 is a palm-sized, brightly colored orange AI assistant designed to perform actions on behalf of the user, even if those actions involve multiple or complex steps.
Described by the company as a “pocket companion,” the device can be used for various purposes such as booking flights, streaming music, or editing Photoshop images.
Users hold down a button on the right side of the device, much like using a walkie-talkie, to communicate with their R1, issuing commands in natural language and viewing a simplified visual interface that represents their assistant as a pixel art-style bunny.
Rabbit hopes that consumers will rethink many of their digital habits with this simplified invention, including how they interact with applications, what security standards they accept, and what their devices can look like.
The R1 hosts Rabbit’s custom artificial intelligence, a type of Large Action Model (LAM), which represents an evolution of Large Language Models (LLMs) that have become well-known due to chatbots like ChatGPT.
For industrial design, Rabbit collaborated with Teenage Engineering, known for its innovative designs of music equipment such as synthesizers and speakers, to create an original look with a nostalgic touch.
The company says it drew inspiration from the Japanese digital pet toy Tamagotchi and aimed to make the device “as strikingly beautiful as it is intuitively functional.”
In addition to a 2.88-inch touchscreen display and a touch-to-talk button, physical components include a scroll wheel for navigating the display and the “rabbit eye” — a rotating camera for computer vision. This enables the agents to carry out tasks such as “looking” in the fridge and identifying ingredients there to suggest recipes.
As an avatar, the operating system is represented on the screen by a bunny head that jumps up and down while processing information and bops along with headphones when playing music.
Rabbit also promises high-level encryption and says users will always be aware of and in control of actions delegated to the agents. The device will not store users’ credentials for third-party services.
All processing is done within data centers rather than on the device, which Rabbit says means the device is inexpensive — retailing for $199 (£159) — and consumes little power.
