Apple Store down ahead of WWDC keynote, with new Siri speaker, iPads and Macs expected

The change confirms that new hardware is going to be launched

Tables of Apple Mac products on display in the new Apple Store In Covent Garden on August 5, 2010 in London, England (Getty)

The Apple Store is offline ahead of its big event today.

The company is holding its Worldwide Developers Conference where it will show off the software that will power the iPads, Macs and iPhones of the future. But it's also going to start selling some of those new futuristic computers, as well.

The biggest new product of the day is expected to be the Siri speaker, Apple's answer to the talking assistants encased in cylinders like the Google Home and Amazon Alexa. But that might not actually make it onto the store today – it's expected to be unveiled during the keynote but not actually made available until later on.

But there are expected to be new computers and tablets.

Apple is rumoured to be preparing to introduce a completely redesigned iPad, which slims down the bezel down the side of the screen and so allows it to take up less space. That's expected to replace the current 9.7-inch iPad Pro.

There's also expected to be new MacBooks. The Pro that was released late last year will probably see an update and a price drop, and the 12-inch MacBook and even MacBook Air might get upgrades of their own.

It's still not clear whether or not Apple actually needs to take down its website to refresh it anymore. Until recently, it ran on much older infrastructure and was thought to require taking down to come back up – but it was redesigned in 2015, in a move that many had presumed would allow it to be updated more easily.

Still, taking the website down has become an important and expected part of new launches, helping to signal to people that new products are on their way.