Assistant is Google’s personal assistant that is capable of answering questions, performing automated tasks, and more.
Google is preparing a new way to quickly interact with Assistant on your smartwatch, using a new Wear OS Tile with customizable shortcuts, and we have your first look.
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Back in February, Google announced that Assistant would gain a Lens-powered “Search screen” feature that’s a true “What’s on my screen” replacement. We’re now seeing it rolled out on more Android devices.
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Google announced internally today that it’s updating Google Assistant with the latest LLM (large language model) technology.
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The Google Maps app for Android has, for years now, had the same old voice input that’s slow and not as accurate as Google’s latest offerings. Finally that’s changing, as Google Maps is rolling out a new voice input experience powered by Google Assistant.
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One of the most straightforward features of generative AI tools is the ability to take long pieces of text and summarize them into a few short bullet points. Soon, you’ll be able to use Google Assistant to summarize almost any webpage.
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Android Auto is delivering a new update to its version of the Google Assistant which comes more in line with the current design on smartphones, and it comes just as Android Auto v10.0 makes its way to users.
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Wear OS 3 comes with a whole host of upgrades, but it also led to the removal of Google Assistant for some smartwatches such as those sold by Fossil. Months later, though, the Assistant is finally expanding.
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Yesterday we reported that Chamberlain’s MyQ integration with Google Assistant is breaking for some users and, now, the company has further confirmed that it has officially discontinued the integration because, well, no one actually liked it.
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Smart garage door openers are incredibly useful, but like any other smart home product, they’re only as good as the support behind them. Following several issues in years past, Chamberlain’s MyQ garage door openers are currently telling some users that Google Assistant support is “no longer available,” and it might just be Chamberlain’s fault.
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A year ago yesterday, Google announced that it was ending support for third-party Assistant voice apps, including games, and this is now underway on the Nest Hub.
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As we’ve been tracking since last month, Google now offers an At a Glance complication on the Pixel Watch.
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Google Assistant has not seen too many updates as of late (as the team focuses on Bard and generative AI), but it is now adding two new US English voices.
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As previewed last September, Google Tasks is replacing Reminders and getting Assistant integration. Google is now more widely rolling out the ability to switch over and complete the migration.
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Last June, Google announced it was removing third-party Assistant voice apps and Nest Hub games in a year’s time. With that set to occur on June 20, another casualty of that deprecation is the shutdown of third-party Google Assistant Notes & Lists integration.
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Wear OS 3 has brought a lot of positive changes to the smartwatch platform but also some frustrating problems. Like other smartwatches, Mobvoi’s new TicWatch Pro 5 will lack support for Google Assistant on the new update.
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The Pixel Watch and Wear OS could stand to be a bit more contextual, and Google may be addressing that with an Assistant-powered “At a Glance” complication.
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You’ve long been able to ask Google Assistant to play radio stations on all devices, but this integration is currently down amidst an outage. The company has not removed this capability.
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Back in 2020, Google introduced a neat new feature on its Nest Hub smart displays which would add a theme to the timer to match certain types of food you were cooking, among other things. For a limited number of users, though, that feature has been broken for a few weeks.
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The Google app on Android is changing “Hands-free” voice settings related to paired Bluetooth devices with microphones, like headphones but also cars, and Assistant. This appears to just be a modernization rather than any major shift.
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In 2016, Google Assistant was announced as “your own personal Google,” and Sundar Pichai believes it has the AI “technology to actually do those things now.” The Google CEO was interviewed by the New York Times on Bard and the broader state of AI.
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With the upcoming release of the Pixel Tablet, Google is once again reshaping the Google Assistant smart display ecosystem, which started on Android and has now come full circle back to Android.
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The Google Nest Hub is a useful device and, with its second generation, it’s also a great option for playing music. But lately, Google seems to have tweaked the Nest Hub and several other smart speakers to be considerably louder when playing at lower volume settings.
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The conversational aspects of generative AI and large language models (LLMs), like LaMDA, make it ripe for smart assistants. Google specifically mentioned Assistant two years ago as a product where it hopes to incorporate “better conversational features.” That has yet to happen, but the Google Assistant team is helping lead Bard development.
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As part of the LaMDA announcement in May of 2021, Google cited Assistant, Search, and Workspace as products where it hopes to “incorporat[e] better conversational features.” A new report today looks into Google’s reluctance to launch and incorporate LaMDA into products before OpenAI and Microsoft.
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