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Google Home is great for anyone who's all-in with Google and doesn't have Amazon Prime in their lives.
Google has the search smarts to rule the artificial intelligence space, and its first smart speaker is the Google Home, powered by its Google Assistant AI.
It's a great little smart speaker that's customizable and cute enough to fit in with any room's decor. You can choose from a variety of cloth and metallic bases in fun colors. The top portion is white and angled gently so the touch-sensitive surface is positioned perfectly for your hands. Although some people say it looks like the air freshener in your bathroom (it does, to be perfectly honest), we think the Home looks more stylish than Amazon's monolithic-looking Echo lineup.
When you say, "Hey Google," or "Okay Google," little lights dance along the top touch surface in Google's signature colors: red, blue, green, and yellow. You can ask Home to play music from Google Play, Spotify, YouTube Music, Pandora, and TuneIn. The sound quality is decent and even at top volume, it sounds as good as most Bluetooth speakers you can buy for the same price.
Google Home has lots of smart features, including the ability to read you a daily briefing, give you a recap of the day's news from NPR and BBC World News, and answer your questions on just about any topic. Since Home uses Google's search graph to answer you, the entire knowledge of the internet is open to you. Ask about weather, traffic, stocks, or trivia, and Google will know the answer.
Google also has lots of experience with different accents, so Home is likely to understand you easily even if you have a strong Colombian accent like my boyfriend. One of my favorite features is playing trivia games with Google. The Assistant will play cheesy game show music and act as the goofy host, giving you a weird nickname when you say, "Okay Google, play a game." She also tells really bad dad jokes that'll have you groaning and guffawing.
Home works with a variety of smart home devices, too, so you can use it to turn off your Phillips Hue light bulbs, control your Nest thermostat, or stream media to your Chromecast. If you have any of these devices in your smart home, Google Home is a great complement to those products. I've been using Google Home since it came out, and I love it.
There are still funny limitations, and Google Assistant may tell you she "doesn't know how to help with that yet," but "yet" is the operative word here. Google will only continue to improve Home, so it's a truly fabulous option for a smart speaker — especially now that it can be had for less than $100.
Expert reviewers across the web agree that Google Home is a great smart speaker, including CNET, Pocket Lint, The Guardian, and Wirecutter.
Pros: Customizable base, best at search, good voice recognition, good sound, blends into decor, works with some smart home devices, plays games, affordable, works best with Google services
Cons: Ecosystem isn't as fleshed out as it could be, limitations with cross-platform support, not as much smart home support as Alexa (although Google is improving in these areas quickly)
Buy the Google Home at Walmart for $69.99