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As we near the retail arrival of the new Google Home Speaker later this week, Google just pushed out a huge update to Google Home and the Gemini for Home experience. The number of improvements, as well as bug fixes, might make this one of their biggest updates to date.
For Gemini for Home, Google has is much better at avoiding accidental hotword triggers, reliably ends Continued Conversation, has improved filtering of background speech, and is even faster at dealing with alarms, timers, and lists.
On a media front for Gemini for Home, Google is also improving the speed of Spotify and YouTube, has better accuracy for playing or shuffling music or playlists, and should be good at answering questions about music playing.
As a big of a bonus, Google announced that Gemini for Home now works with the whole family, including kids.
For the Google Home app (v4.20), camera playback responsiveness on Android is faster, there’s a new System Health alert if you have a Nest thermostat, and you’ll find improved support for Matter Switches.
Finally, for Google Home-related bug fixes, Google has touched on at least 8 areas for improvement. From faster widgets and light color changes to a smoother automation tab and Android TV reliability fixes, there is a lot to read through below.
The full changelog is below and I recommend reading through it.
Try saying:
Gemini for Home voice assistant is now available for everyone in the family, including kids, in all supported countries and languages. Whether they’re asking how to spell a word or looking for a laugh with a new joke, Gemini is ready to help them learn and play. Learn more on how to guide your child’s Gemini for Home experience.
We know identifying family members correctly matters. To improve detection, we are automatically updating your Familiar Face library to save the most recent and accurate examples, while also updating face recognition for Advanced plan users to use additional signals like clothing when a subject’s face is not visible. By focusing on the best examples and using these new signals, we reduce missed or incorrect identifications and make managing your library easy. Learn more about Familiar Face detection here.
We are adding improved sound detection to the AI descriptions for your cameras. They can now identify specific sounds – like dogs barking, alarms, or footsteps – and include them directly in its video descriptions for person, car, or motion events that contain sound. Simply check the descriptions on your camera’s video events in the Home app. With even better analysis of both the audio and video from your clips, your descriptions should provide better insight into what is happening in the clip, even if it’s off-camera. This allows you to also use Ask Home to search through your video history for things like ‘Did the dog bark during the delivery?’ Learn more about detected sounds here. Requires the Advanced plan of Google Home Premium.
These features and improvements are available in Google Home App version 4.20, and are beginning to roll out today.
We’re always working behind the scenes to make your home run more smoothly. This week’s updates focus on several issues to improve your daily experience.
// Google
