Hey Google, meet Gemini: the new voice of your smart home

Launching October 1st, Gemini For Home is a suite of new AI-powered features for Google’s smart home hardware and software.
The biggest change: Gemini is replacing Google Assistant on all of Google’s smart speakers, all the way back to the original Google Home speaker. This LLM-powered upgrade, announced at Google I/O, will be available through an Early Access program at first, with a wider rollout planned for next year.
On smart speakers, Gemini brings an entirely new voice assistant that uses and understands natural language, can interpret context, and can pull in more real-time information. You still activate it with the wake words “hey Google,” but Google Assistant has been evicted.
“Gemini for Home is the intelligence for your entire home,” Anish Kattukaran, head of product at Google Home and Nest, tells The Verge. “It’s not going to just replace Assistant on speakers and displays, but it’s going to upgrade your other devices as well, your cameras and doorbells, where you interact with those devices, and bring those smarts collectively to your entire home.”

I'm not excited for Apple to invent smart homes after this, completing the duopoly of LLMs being in everyone's homes even harder than before.

Long live Home Assistant

9 comments

Not MY smarthome.
It’s still really obnoxious that Lemmy downvotes stuff like this.
- My entire home and ecosystem is Google/Android. The Assistant is better than Gemini. I couldn't even set a timer correctly with Gemini. Oof.
  
  Few will see that discussion because the thread is at negative votes.
- I downvote because it's paywalled.
  Paywalled links are just ads with extra steps.
  
  Here... https://archive.is/fIW9L
Launching October 1st, Gemini For Home is a suite of new AI-powered features for Google’s smart home hardware and software.
The biggest change: Gemini is replacing Google Assistant on all of Google’s smart speakers, all the way back to the original Google Home speaker. This LLM-powered upgrade, announced at Google I/O, will be available through an Early Access program at first, with a wider rollout planned for next year.
On smart speakers, Gemini brings an entirely new voice assistant that uses and understands natural language, can interpret context, and can pull in more real-time information. You still activate it with the wake words “hey Google,” but Google Assistant has been evicted.
“Gemini for Home is the intelligence for your entire home,” Anish Kattukaran, head of product at Google Home and Nest, tells The Verge. “It’s not going to just replace Assistant on speakers and displays, but it’s going to upgrade your other devices as well, your cameras and doorbells, where you interact with those devices, and bring those smarts collectively to your entire home.”
I'm not excited for Apple to invent smart homes after this, completing the duopoly of LLMs being in everyone's homes even harder than before.
Long live Home Assistant