Getting started with Google Assistant
SMART, ALWAYS THERE FOR YOU — HAS GOOGLE CREATED THE PERFECT COMPANION?
AFTER A LIMITED release at first to Pixel devices (as well as Allo app and Google Home), Google Assistant has slowly made its way to most current phones. Having a digital personal assistant in your pocket can be very handy, and Google is taking it to the next level with Duplex, which is a huge upgrade for Assistant, showing more intelligence and more natural speech patterns — the demo video is a must watch ( youtu.be/D5VN56jQMWM). There isn’t even a launch date yet, though, so in the meantime, we’ve put together a guide to getting the most from your Google Assistant in her current state.
GETTING STARTED
Google Assistant is available on (most) devices running at least Android 6.0, as well as Google Home. Google has a fantastic resource with information and guides to what Google Assistant can do, which is well worth checking out (
If you don’t have the app already, navigate to the Google Play store and download it. Depending on your Android version, Assistant is likely already available through the Google Launcher, but the app makes accessing and setting it up easy. If you had not done it already, Assistant will prompt you to train your voice model — which can also be done in the settings. You can also set preferences such as weather results in Celsius, what voice your assistant uses and if you prefer results for getting around by public transport, car or walking. Make sure the assistant is set to be always listening (‘Settings > Phone’), so you don’t have to press anything to activate the Assistant.
Google Assistant gets a lot more useful when it can interact with other devices, such as smart lights, Chromecast, smart TVs and more. The setup method varies for connecting devices so follow their individual instructions, but they can be managed under settings in the Assistant app. You can also link accounts, such as Spotify, YouTube, Netflix and many others, and then control them with your voice. Once again, these are all managed via the settings in the app but it can be hard to find — after opening the tab, tap the little flattened U icon in the top right, then tap the three dots top right on the Explore page.
WHAT CAN GOOGLE ASSISTANT DO?
It might feel clunky to use voice commands at first, but the Assistant can actually be quite powerful. The best way to get a feel is to just play around — the Assistant can be very smart, but other times easily confused. You can pretty much ask anything that can be Googled, but with an added personal customisation to the results. For some cases,