Google’s Gemini for Home Assistant Starts Rolling Out in Early Access in the US

Google’s new Gemini for Home assistant is starting to roll out in early access in the US. Early enthusiasts can sign up for early access in the Google Home app, and Google eventually plans to invite users to upgrade to its new smart home assistant.

Gemini for Home is set to replace the Google Assistant on Google’s smart speakers and displays. It should support all the same actions that can already be performed by Google Assistant, though it responds differently as it uses Google’s Gemini models under the hood. Google also said that Gemini for Home won’t have access to basic personal information shared with Google Assistant, as the two products are different.

“Gemini represents a new generation of AI for your home, one that’s conversational, intuitive, and can reason about your requests in new ways. This is a big shift from a traditional voice assistant. Instead of only following pre-set commands, Gemini can understand more ambiguous, natural language and have free-flowing conversations,” Google explained yesterday.

A Google Home Premium subscription will unlock the Gemini Live experience, which enables free-flowing conversations with the assistant. To initiate a Gemini Live, Google Home Premium users will need to say “Hey Google, let’s chat” instead of the standard “Hey Google” voice command.

Gemini for Home is supported on all Google Home and Nest speakers, as well as Nest Hub smart displays. The Gemini Live experience, however, is only available on the Google Nest Audio, Nest Mini (2nd gen), Nest Hub (2nd gen), and Nest Hub Max.