Watching the keynote from Google’s IO conference a couple of weeks ago I was impressed with the advances Google is bringing to Google Home, and decided it was time to add another assistant to our home.
We love our Amazon Echo and Echo Dots, and Google and Amazon will jockey back and forth with new capabilities in the early stages of this segment, so it’s way too early to claim a victor, but for now, each has it’s advantages and disadvantages.
Here are some initial thoughts, at least for the current versions:
- Alexa is Friendlier:
- I’ve mentioned it before, but saying “Alexa” instead of “Ok Google” has a friendlier, more personal feel. Plus, “Ok Google”, “Ok Google”, “Ok Google”, sounds and feels robotic over time, not conversational.
- Even “Hey Cortana” is better than “Ok Google” (but as Neil Diamond said, “To no one there, And no one heard at all, Not even the chair”).
- Google Home is Smarter:
- I’ve only done some initial testing but Google Home is smarter when it comes to both simple things, like setting timers, as well as more complex things, like figuring out driving times.
- For instance with timers, while Alexa does have the ability to set multiple timers, you can’t currently give them names like “Turkey”, “Green Beans” and “Potatoes”. With Google Home you can, making them more intuitive.
- For driving or traffic, if I ask Alexa “How long will it take me to drive to Seattle?” She replies, “Your current location is 5.82 miles, 9.36 kilometers from Seattle, as I don’t know you’re speed I can’t tell you how long it will take”. And worse, if I ask “What’s the traffic like between here and Seattle?” she simply plays a tone and provides no information.
- Alternatively, and understandably given Google’s mapping and navigation services, when I ask the same questions, the replies are “With light traffic it is 32 minutes from here to Seattle” and “There’s light traffic between here and Seattle, it is 32 minutes by car as usual”.
- I Trust Alexa More:
- Meaning, I trust Amazon more, to the extent you can trust any large corporation looking to make a buck off of you. But, at least with Amazon, my feeling is given the vast majority of their revenue comes from consumers buying from and through them, they won’t risk (as much) the alienation that could be created by making an incremental fraction of a cent by selling my personal data.
- I’m not naïve, there really isn’t any such thing a “personal data” anymore. Maybe I should rephrase this one “I Trust Google Less”.
- Google Home Has Better Home Entertainment Integration:
- While we love using our Echo Dot as a music streaming device, we have to physically connect that Dot as an input source on our home stereo, and we have to tell that specific Dot, either by being in the same room, or with a Voice Remote, what to play.
- Google Home, on the other hand, works with $35 Chromecast devices/dongles, that is a wifi connected device you plug in as an input source and then name, like “home stereo”, so you can tell the Google Home in the kitchen “Play Ed Sheeran radio on home stereo”, and you can cast video’s, etc to TVs that have attached Chromecast devices.
- Alexa is Better at Shopping:
- It’s Amazon for gosh sakes, so ordering things, especially recurring items, is super easy on the Echo devices.
- Google Home Can recognize Who’s Talking:
- Google is implementing voice recognition allowing it to distinguish between individuals in your household, so when I say “Add a Dentist appointment to my calendar for 2:00pm Tuesday” it is added to my calendar , but if my partner says the same thing it is added to their calendar.
- We Can Control Alexa Remotely:
- You can argue this one back and forth, and kind of contradicts point #4 above, but for $30 you can purchase an Echo Voice Remote so you can control your device from anywhere within Bluetooth range. This is helpful if you use an Echo as a streaming device connected to your home stereo and it’s located in another room.
- The flip side is, with $35 Chromecast devices you can effectively do the same thing, assuming you have a Google Home device in the room(s) you want to control music from.
- And, as I’ve previously written, this is really more of a short-term issue as I expect over time we will have listening devices located through our living spaces, in addition to the phones we carry, which will allow us to control any connected device, in any room of our homes, from any other room.
clarkb... 