Assistant is Google’s personal assistant that is capable of answering questions, performing automated tasks, and more.
Google has had a strong focus over the past few months on its Digital Wellbeing initiative. This first started in Android Pie with a suite of new tools to track your tech habits. Now, Google is starting to roll out Digital Wellbeing for Google Home.
Our upcoming APK Insight of Google app 8.33 uncovered a URL for a new “Lists and Notes” web app that ties into the Google Assistant. It comes as Google is working on allowing users to set their own default list and note taking provider in Assistant.
Google Keep is a popular way to store miscellaneous notes, and soon, Google is bringing back a much-requested feature. Google Keep will once again be the home of the Google Assistant shopping list.
For quite some time now, most Android phones have had the option to be unlocked via your voice and an “OK Google” or “Hey Google” command. Using “Voice Match,” Google has offered up this functionality on its past two Pixel phones, but now its latest doesn’t support it. Oddly, Pixel 3 doesn’t support this feature.
The Nvidia Shield TV is easily the best Android TV box you can buy today, and it just seems to be getting better with updates. Following a promotion which teased the functionality earlier this month, Nvidia is detailing all of the new controls you can use with a Google Home and the Shield TV.
Quite a while back, Google opened the Assistant to other device manufacturers, which created the opportunity for Google Home experiences with a greater audio experience than Google’s own speakers offer. SōLIS is one of many brands seeking to do so this year with their new SO-2000 smart speaker.
In March, Google introduced a universal Express shopping cart shared by both Assistant and Search on mobile, desktop, as well as Home devices. Heading into the holiday season, Google is announcing new Shopping Actions partnerships with major brands Best Buy, Nike, and Sephora.
Back in August, Google began testing a redesigned settings page for Assistant that is in line with the Google Material Theme. This week, the simplified Google Assistant settings page with tabs is rolling out.
JBL is a big brand for audio, and for the most part, the company makes some killer products. In recent months, the brand has also been working with Google quite a lot to integrate Assistant into some of its products. Lately, I’ve been trying out a couple of headphones with Google Assistant built-in, so let’s take a closer look.
Over the past year, the number of Google Assistant headphones available have proliferated. This, unfortunately, is not due to the success of Pixel Buds, but rather various brands adding one-tap access to notifications and Google Search on Android. All these headphones now support the Pixel Buds real-time translation feature.
The Google Home Hub is Google’s very first attempt at a Smart Display and fuses the powerful functionality of the Google Home with a display for yet more use-cases. We’ve already seen a few Smart Displays from brands such as JBL and Lenovo, but unlike those options, Google’s first party design follows the design language of pre-existing Home devices and actually looks like something you would want in your home.
At 10/9, Google announced Downtime and Filters for the Google Home Hub. These Digital Wellbeing features will be coming to all Smart Displays and Assistant speakers, as Google’s initiative to manage device usage is integrating with Assistant on phones.
Just yesterday, Google began rolling out a complete visual redesign of Assistant for Android and iOS, as well as allowing developers to better monetize Actions. Google Assistant is now gaining the ability to help you book a ride from Uber, Lyft, and more with just your voice.
Voice Access is now out of beta with the accessibility service allowing you to control your Android device without touching the display. Available on the Google Play Store, it should give millions around the globe the ability to get more from their smart devices.
In addition to a big visual redesign for Assistant on phones, Actions on Google today are becoming a more viable platform for developers. These Google Assistant apps can now offer subscriptions and other digital goods to users.
First announced at I/O 2018, Google is officially rolling out a Google Assistant redesign for mobile phones. Focussed on bigger visuals and new controls, the company has been testing several of the components for the past several weeks.
We know just about everything we could possibly imagine knowing about Google’s upcoming Pixel 3 smartphones, but that isn’t stopping the company from teasing its October 9th event. Now, Google is teasing the event through Google Assistant and even confirming Pixel 3 pre-orders for October 9th.
Google has recently acquired Onward, an AI-powered chatbot startup that creates a range of automated customer service and sales tools for business usage.
Google Assistant is a very powerful tool, and on select devices, it even packs a few extra tricks. This week, Sony is announcing some unique Google Assistant commands for Xperia XZ3 owners that offer up some quick voice shortcuts for some of the device’s best features.
Google has its own streaming platforms in Android TV and the Chromecast ecosystem, and both of those work brilliantly with the Google Assistant. Now, it’s looking like Roku is going to add support for letting users control a Roku with Assistant.
As we approach the October 9th Made by Google event, there has been an uptick in rumors for other devices that might debut. However, today, we have another leak of the Pixel 3 XL that focuses on the dual front-facing cameras.
Google Assistant’s smart display initiative has so far seen two pieces of hardware with the Lenovo Smart Display and JBL Link View. However, those products aren’t perfect, and they lack some of the finesse we’ve seen from Google’s own Assistant hardware. Now we’ve got our first look at the Google Home Hub, and there are a few places it has a chance to improve on the competition in some big ways.
Google got into the smart speaker game quite a while after Amazon, but things have been continually getting better for Assistant hardware. During Q2 of 2018, Google Home Mini turned out to be the number one selling smart speaker.
We got our first look at the Google Home Hub earlier today, showing off a unique new design for a Google Assistant smart display. Outside of the hardware, though, it seems Google may have plans of seriously undercutting the competition by slapping a $149 price tag on the product.