Humane Flooded with $1 Million in AI Pin Refunds as Dumpster Fire Rages

When the Humane AI Pin launched in April, it was absolutely crushed by reviewers. So it’s no surprise that the $699 AI wearable saw near-instant returns from unhappy customers, according to a new report.

The Verge was able to obtain internal sales data, which shows that between May and August of this year, Humane returned more AI Pins than were purchased.

No product sells well if some of the biggest tech reviewers criticize it. In his infamous review, YouTuber Marques Brownlee called the Pin “the worst product” he’s ever reviewed. Engadget’s Cherlynn Low wrote in her review, “Not only is the Humane AI Pin slow, temperamental, and barely intelligent, but using it made me look pretty stupid.”

The recall of a charging case that could burst into flames certainly didn’t help Humane’s cause.

In late May, word broke that Humane was going up for sale, with a valuation somewhere between $750 million and $1 billion. This came as no surprise to Jason England, editor-in-chief of Tom’s Guide Computing, who predicted that startups like Humane and Rabbit were destined to be acquired by larger companies.

But remember, this happened right after Humane switched its AI models to OpenAI’s GPT-4o, which was most likely a move too little, too late.

HP was reportedly in the running to buy the company, but that fell through. Meanwhile, The Information reported that the company is negotiating with investors to increase its debt, which would be converted into equity.

In the midst of all this, somehow, according to sales data, the AI Pin sold just over $9 million in accessories and devices. Apparently, over 1,000 purchases were canceled before shipping, and over $1 million worth of products were returned to Humane.

About 10,000 AI Pins and accessories have been shipped so far. A New York Times report from early June painted a picture of the company hoping to sell close to 100,000 devices. Some math on a napkin shows that somehow 7,000 AI Pins are still floating around on lapels around the world.

Apparently Humane doesn’t have the ability to refurbish or recycle the AI Pin, so they’re just sitting on the returned product since there’s no way to reassign devices to new users. This is being blamed on a T-Mobile limitation, which T-Mobile declined to comment on.

A Humane spokesperson told The Verge that the financial figures they provided were inaccurate, but declined to provide details or deny the information more directly.

According to their X profiles, both co-founders, Imran Chaudhri and Bethany Bongiorno, stated that the Humane team is hard at work on fixing the software for the AI badge and is rolling out improvements on a weekly basis.

Bongiorno’s recent X thread details the addition of GPT-40, Google’s Gemini, and improvements to translations, calendar recall, and “musical indirect ads.”

From the outside, this is a company that is working hard to improve its device and provide customers with greater usability, while on the inside, this is a company that managed to swindle $200 million in investment yet laid off employees before launching the product and had management turnover.

An anonymous source told The Verge that the AI Pin received harsh feedback from early testers, including friends and family of employees, with some claiming the product was unable to play demo videos. The device launched despite that feedback.

Not to be outdone, the buggy Rabbit R1 that came out shortly after the AI Pin has its own issues. Just this month, 404 Media reported that the company was refusing to take responsibility for its ongoing security breach issues, blaming everyone from journalists and hackers to “malicious employees.”

Perhaps AI necklaces like the AI Friend companion or the Limitless pendant will show the future of AI wearables, but Humane and Rabbit are destined for the scrap heap in the meantime.