Google has had voice search features in
Android for years, but when Google Assistant
rolled out on the Pixel in October 2016,
everything finally came together.
You can now get Assistant on all modern Android
devices, and Google announced new Assistant
features at I/O 2018 that will make it even better (okay,
and maybe a little too real, in the case of Duplex).
It can be easy to miss the improvements if
you don’t obsessively keep an eye on the news,
so here they are in one place: the 12 coolest new
features in Google Assistant.
Sync connected smart home devices
Google Assistant supports numerous smart home
devices, but you might notice that devices you’ve
just added to your account don’t always work right
away. That’s because Assistant isn’t constantly
scanning for new connections. You can give it
a kick-start. After adding a new smart home device
such as a camera or thermostat, open up Assistant
and say, “Sync my devices”. Assistant tells you it’s
syncing with your connected accounts, and a few
seconds later any newly added devices will appear in
your list. Make sure to add them to rooms in Assistant
for full functionality.
Send daily info
Assistant is great for calling up little tidbits like the
weather, stock quotes, or even jokes. You don’t
even have to ask every time, though. You can
have Assistant proactively send you certain bits of
information as a daily update.
To configure a daily update, start by asking your
question normally – ask it for the weather, a dad
joke, whatever. After Assistant pulls up the content,
you can follow up with “Send this to me daily”.
Assistant asks what time you want the update, and
you’re all set. To change or cancel a daily update, just
say, “See my subscriptions”.
Have Assistant remember things for you
Your squishy human brain is fallible, but Google
Assistant can remember things without fail. All you
have to do is ask it. You can tell Assistant to remember
things just by saying “Remember that [some piece
of information]”. You could tell Google to remember
where you parked, what you did with the spare house
key, your high score in Tetris, or anything else. As a
handy bonus, Assistant also saves maps when you
tell it where you parked. Later, you can ask Google
to recall the information in various ways. You can be
direct, like asking Assistant “Where did I park?” You
can recall factoids you’ve saved with “What did I say
about [x]?” or “Remind me about [x]”.
Search your Google Photos uploads
Google Photos is a fantastic backup solution for all
your snapshots. Google offers unlimited storage
of images and videos, provided you’re okay with a
little compression, and Pixel owners get free fullquality
backups. If you want to look for specific
photos you’ve taken, you can do it right from Google
Assistant. All you have to do is ask.
Assistant plugs into the amazing search capabilities
of Google Photos, so you can ask to see almost
anything. You can ask Assistant to pull up pictures of
specific people, locations, and even objects. Tap the
image results to scroll through them immediately,
or open Google Photos via the shortcut under your
pictures. Just make sure you preface your request with
something like ‘my photos’ to ensure you get images
from your Google Photos library rather than images
from a Google search.
Routines
Using Assistant to do the same few things all the
time can be tedious, but Routines might be able to
help. This feature allows you to connect multiple
actions to a single command. There are only a few
predetermined routine commands right now, but they
could still save you a lot of time. To get started, open
the Assistant settings and scroll down to Routines. In
this menu, Google provides six commands right now:
good morning, bedtime, I’m leaving (leaving home),
I’m home, let’s go to work, and let’s go home. Say any
of those, and you’ll trigger the associated Routine.
Each one includes a few customization options
including smart home devices, travel info, and audio
playback. You can also modify the trigger phrase at
the top of the Routine settings page.
Take and share screenshots
You can capture screenshots on Android phones by
holding the power and volume buttons, but Assistant
can do it, too. In fact, it might be faster if you intend to
share the screenshot right away. Open Assistant and
say, “take a screenshot” or “share a screenshot”.
It takes a moment to capture the screenshot, but
you’ll get a preview as soon as it’s done. Assistant
then immediately brings up the sharing interface so
you can send the screen to a message or upload it
someplace. The screenshots taken via Assistant aren’t
saved locally, so you won’t end up with clutter from
repeated screenshot captures.
Listen to podcasts
Google has built a basic podcast interface into the
Google app, and the easiest way to access it is via
Assistant. You might want to listen to podcasts in
this fashion because Google’s solution is quick and
easy. Just say, “listen to [podcast name]” to fire up
the latest episode. If you were in the middle of an
episode, Assistant picks up where you left off.
Your progress is not device-specific, either. You can
start listening to a podcast on your phone, then tell
Assistant on Google Home you want to listen to the
same podcast. Rather than start, over, it starts where
you last listened on your phone.
Explore menu
Google used to hide all of Assistant’s features in a
series of esoteric, buried menus. Now, there’s a much
more sensible way to find out what sort of cool things
you can do with Assistant in the Explore menu.
To access this menu, open Assistant and tap the
blue drawer icon in the upper right corner. Here, you
can find all the services supported by Assistant broken
down into categories like Social & Communication,
Education & Reference, Games & Fun, and more.
Each tile links to a full info page where you can
see sample commands and (if necessary) link your
account. Bottom line: checking out the Explore menu
is the easiest way to keep track of newly added apps
and services. There are also some general Assistant
command suggestion at the top. You don’t even have
to speak the suggestions, just tap the bubble and
they’ll be dropped right into Assistant.
Typing to Assistant
Google Assistant first appeared in the Allo app, and in
that iteration, you could input text to ‘chat’ with the
Google’s bot. But the more powerful baked-in phone
version of Assistant began its life with only voice input.
That’s fine when you’re in a situation where you can
talk to your phone, but voice dictation isn’t always
appropriate. Well, you can type your questions and
commands, too.
To access the keyboard in Assistant, just longpress
your home button as you normally would. But
instead of speaking right away, tap the keyboard icon
in the lower-left corner. Assistant will expand to fill
the screen, and you can begin typing. Assistant will
respond to all the same commands that you’d use
in a voice-dictation situation, and you’ll also find
contextual suggestions above the keyboard. And
because these suggestions are part of Assistant, they
appear no matter which keyboard app you’re using.
Editable history
Google Assistant used to be a transient experience
– whatever you said to Assistant would be lost to the
ether as soon as you left the Assistant UI. But now
there’s a full history of your commands, and you can
edit them too. To access your Assistant history, you
need only drag up on the overlay when Assistant pops
up. This will drop you into a full-screen interface
that shows your recent queries. Scroll up to see
everything you’ve asked and how Assistant answered.
Editing is a snap, too. Long-press on a query, and
it will be highlighted along with Assistant’s reply. From
there, you can either delete or edit it. Deleting will
completely remove the query (and associated activity)
from the history. This is just like removing something
from your Google search history, so it won’t be used
to inform future search and Assistant predictions.
If you choose to edit a query, the text is dropped
into the text field along with an open keyboard. You
can tap send to immediately repeat the command,
or make some changes and send it again. Just note
that none of this undoes the actions performed when
the command was first issued.
Shortcuts
There are dozens of services and apps integrated
with Assistant already, but some of them get
preferential treatment. For example, you can tell
Google to control your Hue lights directly, but lights
connected through Homey require you to preface
all commands with “Tell Homey”. It can get a bit
tedious, but shortcuts are here to help.
To create a shortcut, go to the Assistant settings
and open the settings. Scroll down and tap on the
Shortcuts option. The shortcut screen has a box for
what you want to say, and one below that for what
you want Assistant to actually do in response.
In the top box, input whatever snappy shortcut
phrase you want. It tends to work better if you use the
microphone button to speak the shortcut. Assistant
will sometimes put a sample command in the bottom
box, but you can change that to the command you
want. It has to be the full phrase you’d say to Assistant,
including the ‘Tell [X]’ part if needed. Once your
shortcut is saved, it’ll work by voice and text.
Google Express shopping list
Google Assistant has always been able to add items
to a shopping list, but that list used to live solely in
Google Keep. As such, it was just a list. But Google
recently changed the shopping list functionality to
plug directly into its Google Express delivery service,
which could be very useful if you use it.
All you have to do is say, “Add [item name] to my
shopping list”. It will show up in your Google Express
shopping list instantly. You can access that list in the
Google Express app, or simply say “Show me my
shopping list”. That takes you to the online version
of your list, which can be shared with any of your
contacts. If you’re a Google Express subscriber, you
can tap ‘Shop your list’ to get filtered search results
from supported local retailers. Add items to your cart,
and you’re done.
