Google I/O 2016 is kicking off and the company has announced a new product for the home. This is Google’s answer to Amazon’s Echo, which has dominated the house market since its announcement. Google Home is smart speaker that will listen when you say “Hey Google”. This is similar to Amazon’s Echo which responds to “Alexa”, although it appears that Google’s variant has a nicer design.
Google Home is a great addition to the technology world for several reasons. The first is that someone is finally challenging Amazon, they no longer have the monopoly here. Second, Google is a very smart company and works with many other companies, thus allowing a large area for innovating.
The Home is small and is looks pretty sharp, much better then the black Amazon Echo. As the latter is mostly a circular metal tube, Google gave the Home a unique shape. The top of the device will be home to several LEDs, that will display Google colors, and will let you know when the device is working.
It is a full speaker with a far-ranging microphone as well and this lets it pick up your voice from across the room. The Home needs to be plugged in and by not making it portable, they can make it have solid sound as well. It has Google Cast support out of the box and yes it can control other speakers in your house.
Essentially Google Home can help with everyday tasks, search the web, and mange your entertainment. They are not launching a developer API, as they want to build it up internally first. But it should work with you some home automation products and some other services when it launches later this year.
