The original Google Home Bluetooth speaker released in November 2016 featured a cylindrical shape with colored status LEDs on top. In October 2017, Google announced two additions to the product lineup, the miniature puck-shaped Google Home Mini and a larger Google Home Max. In October 2018, the company released the Google Home Hub, a smart speaker with a 7-inch touchscreen. In May 2019, Google announced that Google Home devices would be rebranded under the Google Nest banner, and it unveiled the Google Nest Hub Max, a larger smart display.
The Google Home now popular by Google Nest, is a line of smart speakers developed by Google under the Google Nest brand. The devices enable users to speak voice commands to interact with services through Google Assistant, the company’s virtual assistant. Both in-house and third-party services are integrated, allowing users to listen to music, control playback of videos or photos, or receive news updates entirely by voice. Google Nest devices also have integrated support for home automation, letting users control smart home appliances with their voice command. The first device, Google Home, was released in the United States in November 2016; subsequent product releases occurred globally from 2017–2019.
The best Google Home Bluetooth Speaker can cater to your specific needs. Google and other smart home manufacturers offer a large selection of audio devices for all sorts of different scenarios, but it doesn’t mean everyone is worth buying.
Each is powered by Google Assistant, a virtual butler that comes pre-installed in the Google Home, Nest Mini, or Google Nest Hub Max speaker. With one of these Google-brand devices, you can take advantage of the best Google Assistant commands. But there are excellent third-party speakers that support Google Assistant, too.
- The ultimate guide for how to use Google Assistant
- All the best Google Home compatible devices technical team tested
Like all the best smart speakers, these will listen to your voice and perform a wide number of tasks, such as streaming music from Spotify, Pandora, and others; controlling smart home devices such as thermostats and lights; acting as a home communication hub; looking up the weather, and ordering you food. You can even use Google Assistant to control your smart TV or act as an interpreter between two different languages.
Google Home Bluetooth Speaker Features
Just start with “Ok Google”
Get hands-free help around the house from your Assistant on speakers with the Google Assistant built-in. Just start with “Ok Google”.
Get answer
Get answers on sports, weather, finance, calculations, translations, and more.
Enjoy entertainment
With a simple voice command, play music, podcasts and radio, or stream videos to your TV with Chromecast.
Plan your day
With your permission, get help with things like your daily brief, your flight information or your commute to work. Check on the latest weather and traffic in your area.
Manage task
With your permission, your Assistant can add items to your shopping list and stock up on essentials. Set alarms, manage your calendar, and make calls hands free.
Control your home
Simply ask your Assistant on Google Home to set the perfect temperature or turn down the lights. Turn on/off devices around your home with supported smart switches.
Google Home Bluetooth Speaker Video Tutorial
How does test the best Google Home Speakers
When testing any of the best Google Home Bluetooth speakers, the first thing that looks at is audio quality. After all, if a speaker doesn’t sound good, then what use is it? You consider the price and purpose of the smart speaker here, too. If it’s a small, budget device, You wouldn’t expect it to sound as good as something that costs five times as much. That said, if a speaker costs a couple of hundred dollars, it better sound awesome.
Google Home Speaker VS Amazon Alexa
Both Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant have developed into excellent voice assistants. They have dueling sets of features: Alexa supports slightly more smart home devices, for instance, while Google lets you upload your own music to its cloud.
Alexa and Google Assistant compare with the World
Alexa and Google Assistant are the only two voice-enabled home assistants worth considering right now. While Apple’s Siri is useful on iPhones and Microsoft’s Cortana works well on PCs, they both fall far behind Alexa and Google Assistant when it comes to answering a wide range of queries and accessing third-party skills by voice on home entertainment devices.
Design Comparison
By comparison, the Google Home measures 5.6 inches tall and 3.8 inches around. It comes in white, with swappable fabric and metal bases in seven colors. The Home’s aesthetic is inspired by candles and wine glasses, with a top half made of smooth, hard plastic that lights up with LEDs in four colors when it’s listening. It also has a touch interface you can use to play and pause music, change volume, and activate Google Assistant. On the back, there’s a physical mute button.
Neither design is going to blow you away, and they now both have the swappable-base approach. It comes down to whether you prefer Amazon’s neutral colors and woods or Google’s bolder colors and metal.
Wi-Fi, Skills, and Calls
The Echo and Home connect to your home Wi-Fi network. In testing, the Home had weaker Wi-Fi connectivity than the Echo.
And while the Home now has more than 1,800 third-party skills, letting you order pizzas from Domino’s and cars from Uber, Alexa has more than 24,000. Many of those Alexa skills aren’t worth much, but there are still more local bus systems, radio stations, and sports stat skills on Alexa.
Both the Amazon Echo and Google Home now let you make outbound voice calls to regular phones. Google Home devices can’t receive calls. Amazon’s Echo can receive calls from other Echos, and it can also receive calls on your home phone line with a $34.99 Echo Connect box.
Both Google Home Bluetooth Speaker and the Echo link up to TVs using their associated streaming sticks. If you buy a Chromecast or a Fire TV Stick, you can tell them to open Hulu or play a show. Google Home has one big content advantage: It integrates with YouTube, which keeps appearing and disappearing from the Amazon Echo Show because of a power struggle between Google and Amazon.
Conclusion
Google Home and the voice assistant inside does seem smarter than Alexa. The technical team continues to update this post as more features and capabilities for both devices are announced. For now, Echo is still leading the way, especially for audiophiles that crave superior audio.