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Latest Google Smart speaker — called the Google Home Speaker — arrived at a starting price of $100. It’s the first new speaker line Google has introduced since 2019, offering a less expensive alternative from Apple Homepod And compete with Amazon’s smallest speakers And 100 dollars HomePod Mini.
The Google Home speaker has dropped the Nest name, for reasons I don’t really understand, but it feels like it Nest Mini They are all adults, measuring about 3.5 inches long and 4 inches wide. It has a 58mm full-range driver for 360-degree sound (similar specifications to the HomePod mini). Google says the speaker delivers 2.5 times louder sound than the tiny Nest Mini and can pair with it Google TV live streaming If you prefer a home theater setup.
Google Speaker is more similar to the HomePod mini than any large smart speaker.
These are not specifications that can compete with something like Echo studio or Wim’s voicebut Google has different goals with its home speaker. The speaker is equipped with a quad-core A55 processor clocked at 2.0 GHz Gemini for homeArtificial Intelligence from Google Recrafted for smart home spaces. The free version promises richer and better answers than the old Google Assistant, though my own experience with Gemini for Home has been mixed so far (Voice assistant It struggles with some simple tasks and answers compared to Alexa Plus, and we’ll have to see what Siri AI brings to the table).
But if you upgrade to a Google Home Premium subscriptionstarting at $10 per month, you can unlock more powerful Gemini for Home features, including deeper interactions, ongoing conversations without pauses for wake words, and various activity summaries if you use Nest surveillance cameras. It’s nice, but I’m not entirely convinced it’s worth the extra cost.
Google Speaker is based on the Gemini, but the average user may not notice much of a difference unless they pay for the advanced capabilities.
Pricing for these AI features is currently a gray area, and each company has its own approach. Amazon is Give Alexa a plus Free if you have a Prime subscription, but very expensive otherwise. Apple hedgingSaying that some future Siri AI features may require a larger iCloud subscription, the company has been very light on details so far.
For me, $10 a month enables a little more Advanced artificial intelligence It doesn’t sound very worthwhile, but Google is offering a deal that makes it easier to experience the full potential of Gemini for Home. Purchase a Google Home speaker within the next few months, and you’ll get six months of Google Home Premium for free, so you can get an extended trial of these features before committing. On a side note, I like the changes Google has made to Google Home app Over the past year, this speaker should be able to control most connected home devices, even without a subscription.
In addition to all the smart features, the speaker has an LED ring at the bottom to indicate its status and capacitive touch controls for manual adjustments (including a microphone off button for privacy). And if you like color, Smart speaker It comes in more options than Nest has ever offered, like berry, jade, and hazelnut. I’ll be trying out the speaker in the coming weeks and will report back on how it compares — and whether it deserves a place at your table, with or without the Gemini.
