Google responds to Amazon Echo Dot with $49 Home Mini
Google Home is going big and going small, as Google challenges Apple and Amazon for smartspeaker supremacy.
On Wednesday, Google announced a $49 Google Home Mini speaker that inevitably will draw comparisons to Amazon’s same-priced Echo Dot. Preorders start today; Home Mini ships on Oct. 19.
At the same time, Google announced a premium smartspeaker called Google Home Max, which at $399 is priced $50 higher than Apple’s upcoming HomePod. Google Home Max is expected to be available in December, around the same time HomePod is slated to arrive.
As with the current $129 Google Home speaker, the latest products will leverage the artificial intelligence-infused-voice driven Google Assistant, Google’s competitive answer to Amazon’s Alexa and Apple’s Siri, in an emerging landscape with rising stakes.
The smartspeaker space is getting more crowded. Harman Kardon and Microsoft are teaming up on an upcoming Invoke speaker with Microsoft’s Cortana assistant. Sonos just announced a $199 smartspeaker called Sonos One that features Alexa.
Both Google and Apple face an uphill battle against Amazon, which eMarketer says controls about 70% of the smartspeaker market. One week ago, Amazon lowered the price of its popular Echo speaker to $99.99 while also unveiling a slew of new offerings built around Alexa. These include the $149.99 Echo Plus speaker and the Echo Spot, a $129.99 compact speaker with a small screen that kind of marries an Echo Dot with the Echo Show, which was the first Echo with a screen.
There had been speculation Google might announce its own new Google Home speaker with a screen during the press event. It did not happen, though Google hasn’t ruled out the possibility.
Google’s intention with Home Mini is to blend the speaker into your household decor. It is covered in fabric with three color options (coral, chalk, charcoal). There are no visible buttons, and the four LEDs are hidden inside and only light up when responding to you or syncing. There is capacitive touch through the fabric that will let you press down on the top of the speaker to play something or pause, or press on the sides to alter the volume. Of course, more often than not you’ll control the product and summon the Google Assistant via voice by barking out “OK Google,” or “Hey Google,” and asking questions or issuing commands.
You can also make voice calls through Google Home, using your own number.
Meanwhile, Google is positioning the higher end Google Home Max as a larger rectangular speaker that, rather than just relying on tweeters and woofers to produce better sound, promises to accomplish that goal through artificial intelligence and machine learning. Google said it has trained the speaker in thousands of different room configurations to fine-tune sound profiles based on the environment. If you place the speaker, say, 5 feet from the wall, Google says it will sound different than if it is a foot from the wall. And through a set of parameters Google calls Smart Sound, the Max speaker can accordingly fine-tune itself in seconds.