Updates coming to the Google Home app!

[Leticia]

Hey everyone,

We're designing the Google Home app for the future of the smart home — a single place to set up, manage, automate, and control thousands of compatible devices in your home. The latest update builds on experiences from Android home controls and Google Nest smart displays to deliver seamless interactions across your home. 

Simpler, more helpful controls

The way you control and interact with your devices is getting better. Over the next few weeks, we are rolling out some new controls on the home view that make it easier to control your connected devices with fewer taps. Android users will notice a familiar experience to the smart home controls that launched with Android 11.

On both Android and iOS, the new controls help you quickly find and understand the status of the devices in your home so you can dim your compatible lights or change the music volume in a snap. You can also tap to turn a device on or off, slide left or right to make adjustments, and long press for more controls.

Privacy settings

This week, check out Google Home app Settings to see new privacy settings. In this centralized entry point to managing your privacy, you can review and adjust your privacy controls, home activity and Assistant data settings right in the app.

Manage your household’s settings, including presence sensing to control which devices can help detect if someone’s home in order to start Home & Away routines. Browse your data, including your home activity and your data in the Assistant. Learn about privacy on your shared devices, Google Privacy & Security Principles, and Nest Privacy & Security commitments in the home.

Coming soon

Later this month, we will make improvements to the home feed to help you better understand what’s happening in and around your home. The update automatically sorts your home’s recent and most important events in an updated clutter free layout. Grouped events will help you understand what happened around the same time instead of scrolling through a list of repetitive events.

We hope you enjoy these new updates! Let us know what you think of the new home view in the comments section.

The Google Nest team

[Redpedr0]

Hopefully some bug fixes as well. Changing PPPOE settings shouldn’t require a factory reset.

https://www.googlenestcommunity.com/t5/Nest-Wifi/Nest-Wifi-WAN-Static-IP-Not-Saved/m-p/39618

Even following all steps doesn’t allow the changIng of settings as detailed. Ability to delete growing list of unknown devices would be nice as well. 

[jamesnixonsteel]

Is this an APK or a server side deal?

[Goody]

Will there now be an available timestamp on downloaded newer Google Nest camera videos?

[PedroLiberal]

Good news, but I sincerely hope you have people looking at the feedback messages people send, because whenever I look at some of the stuff that the competition does and look back at google home, I definitely feel like you’re not really paying any attention to the outside world… google assistant is cool and all, but as you for real when we can’t set tags on items or create levels to separate items between floors? Or won’t even let us change the key word of the assistant, or manage the light groups ourselves? Actually why can’t I create a group of plugs? Why must it be lights?? What if I don’t want to group lights in the same room? Give me options, don’t decide for me.

also please let me choose whether or not I want the chime or the “okay turning on 10 lights” or WHEN I want it. Why can’t I choose “I do not want to her the assistant utter a single word after 10pm”? Just do the chime for me, that’s all…

so many possibilities, sooooo little progress…

[LunarEclipse]

Maybe you will finally release an adapted version for the Wear OS???

[-Craig]

"a single place to set up, manage, automate, and control thousands of compatible devices in your home"

Does this mean Google Home will now be compatible with Google Nest? ie will this update for Google Home allow the ability to managed Google Nest devices such as Google Nest Protect?

[Podunk]

It's outrageous to need two apps to monitor two security cameras and/or view histories. Going with Google's smart home solutions was pricey. Now with the dificulty in monitoring my home's status I wish I had taken another route.

[Roberto83]

Are you upgrading the routines? For example, it's really bad that the routines can only turn on or off lights, but can't do the same for other kinds of devices, even chromecast with google tv (yes they can do that with a custom command, but that's just bad). 

[PedroLiberal]

if any developer or application owner on google side working with google home is reading this, please let me know whether the feedback messages and screenshots Users send are ever looked at or if I can stop wasting my time with them…

im feeing pretty bummed about looking forward to google home updates and then when they come, it’s UX revisions……. Like…. 😞 seriously, do you need us to complain in order to help you get approval for headcounts or something?  Because we can be very annoying…. Insufferable so!! If you need more people just say so and we can get a Reddit thread going…. 

[GoodJayBoy]

Are Motion Sensors Supported on Google Home app / Google Assistant?

Hello Google Home app team and engineers: 

I recently added 2 (two) of  GE/Jasco zwave+ 34193 / ZW6302 portable smart motion sensors into my Samsung SmartThings hub. Everything is working fine there. 

When I link my SmartThings to Google Home app/Google Assistant, however, these 2 sensors are no where to be found. I also tried Unlink and Reconnect SmartThings with Google Home app/Google Assistant, alas no luck. 

On the Amazon.com website where I purchased them (link: https://www.amazon.com/GE-Enbrighten-Activation-SmartThings-34193/dp/B01KQDIU52), it says GE/Jasco zwave+ 34193 / ZW6302 supports SmartThings and Google Assistant (Voice Control). The Google Assistant integration is also displayed/written on the GE/Jasco zwave+ 34193 / ZW6302 box.

I have contacted Samsung SmartHub technical team as well as GE/Jasco technical team, and they both informed me that I should contact the Google Home app / Google Assistant team and engineers to question the missing motion sensor integration with Google Home / Google Assistant. 

Could you please look into this integration and let me know if this can be resolved? 

Truly appreciate the help! Thank you!

[mjoterod]

Does the announcement apply to Android 9 (EMUI 9.1.0) on Huawei P20 Lite, Google Home 2.49.1.8 (release date March 10, 2022)? The article reads "On both Android and iOS..." but my config above doesn't show any change nor the features described. Is there some further setting required or is the phone model/Android version not supported? Thanks, MJO.

[alexmcconnell10]

Thanks, I hate it. Now all devices are the same shape and less distinctive so I have to hunt more for the lights. Instead of being able to access a lights in a room with one click, you now have two long presses. 

I just think y'all don't consider how integrated these kinds of controls are into people's lives. If people had a physical controller in their home and you showed up at their door to swap it out, most would say no. I just wish we had the option to keep things the same instead of being subject the whims of what the Google developers have decided is best. 

[Chali29]

I really hope to see the camera controls in the Google Home app updated soon.  The Nest app has the camera controls (event/history review and slider for example) GH should have.  The GH camera controls are literally trash and Google should do better 

[MplsCustomer]

What about restoring the Google Nest functionality that has been missing from our new Google Nest Camera (Battery) for almost 7 months, and a replacement for the home.nest.com website that you've been promising for almost 7 months now?

[Ice00001]

only hope it can fix the basic functions: camera alart and doorbell alart notifications…. 

[Sebastiaan]

Unbelievable, let's focus on 'design' instead of fixing basic routines and other functionalities. Not to mention that the UI on iOS looks worse than before .. 

[Paul9]

All I need is a NFC reader to trigger a Google Home Routine. With this I believe my life is complete 😀

[neil_rahmouni]

@LunarEclipse the new google assistant is / will be available in wear os 3 iirc

[neil_rahmouni]

@Chali29 the Google home app has camera controls with sliders. What do you miss on the home app compared to the nest one?

[neil_rahmouni]

@Podunk why don't you just use the Google home app?

[docdavid]

Not sure why Google feels the necessity to change things that do not need to be changed.  The Shopping Lists has worked perfectly for me for several years.  Now... not so much.  I used to check off regularly purchased items and then hide them.  Swipe right to check an item off.  Swipe left to delete.  This no longer works.  You can delete all checked items, can't pick and choose.  No way to hide checked items.  So, in other words, you must start from scratch each week.  Thought the app was supposed to make my life simpler, not more difficult.  But then again, based on the comments here, no one from Google with ever read or respond to any of our questions or complaints.  Just needed to vent. 

[Ricky83]

I hope You can come up with a fix For the volume control for the home groups , of not Im going to jump the ship and go to Alexa.

[jpfritz]

@Leticia, if I see correctly on the first screenshot you shared, the volume on a speaker will be controllable directly on the app's homescreen by horizontally sliding the tile representing the speaker. Will the same be the case for speaker groups? 

[Chali29]

@neil_rahmouni if you have ever used the Nest app AND GH, you should know what I am talking about.  Sure, the slider is there on GH, but it in no way is as user-friendly as the Nest app

[ironpig2022]

Can you just make the Nest Cams work the way they did before you moved everything to Google Home?  I've never been so happy with a line of products that overnight became a complete software mess alongside the revelation that the newest cameras dont' work half the time for most people.

You can fix it by going back to the NEST system that worked.  

[MSpeier]

@Leticia Will home app control widgets be included with this update

[Anonymous]

FRAUD !!!! The Nest Camera with Floodlight can not be seen with the NEST APP! FRAUD FRAUD FRAUD.

[justajoe]

Thats cool and all, how are you fixing the lost and broken functionality for the hastily implemented sonos patent hack job?  If you're not how do I go about getting a refund for the Google nest and home systems that don't work?

[Getting_half]

This is great, why do i need 2 different solutions for 2 different cameras in my house.  

[neil_rahmouni]

@Getting_half you can use the Google home app for all nest cameras.

The nest app is being merged into Google home

[Getting_half]

@neil_rahmouni History for my doorbell is at home.nest.com and in the Nest App, the history isnt available in google home.  History for my wired google nest camera is only on an app. (no website at all).  This means scrubbing in the home app, which is glitchy and unresponsive. Additionally I need to download each segment or screen mirror to a tv to see the image on a larger screen. 

So the newer products performance is lower than the older product.

[neil_rahmouni]

@Getting_half ah i thought you were talking about cameras, not doorbells.

You should update the home app, although it used to be weird sometimes in the past, all these issues and glitches have been fixed long ago 🙂

But if you want to see it on a larger screen opening it on the screen (for those who can) or casting on to it should work fine

[Busbeon]

Yeah, I guess you need someone to sort this Google nest energy services, more like no energy. BUILD SOMETING THAT WORKS! AND THEN BUILD A CALL CENTRE THAT RESPONDS TO PEOPLE WHO HAVE ISSUES WITH THE PRODUCT, THAT PRODUCT IS THE NEST HEATLINK - WITH A SUPPORT LINE THAT IS PERMANANT CLOSED 0808 169 2307 - AND Community group that nobody understand or responds to. https://www.googlenestcommunity.com/

5 days with out heating or hot water, nightmare continues! 😣

[MplsCustomer]

@neil_rahmouni 

We've had a Google Nest Camera (Battery) for almost 7 months and have been waiting since then for Google Nest to merge the Google Nest app's functionality into the Google Home app and to provide a replacement for the home.nest.app that works for all cameras. For now, we still view history and administer all of our cameras and doorbells in the Google Nest app except for our one new 2021 camera, and that one camera cannot be seen on our computer screen in the home.nest.app screen. And because our one new 2021 camera doesn't work in the Google Nest app, it lacks the functionality of all of our other cameras (such as Enhance, Scheduling, and manual editing of clips). And we get notifications for all cameras and doorbells except one in the Google Nest app.

[davefoc]

New features might be a nice thing but I'd like to see stuff work that I assumed was working when I bought the new camera.

1. Right now there is no way to completely integrate my old nest cameras with my old nest cameras

2. Right now there is no way to look at my new camera on the PC.

Speaking as a long time user I'm amazed that Google would just abandon functionality and then brag to us about adding new features before you have the features you used to have working. I know marketing people like to figure out how to put great spins on stuff but the spin that you are going to add new features while old features don't work is a little hard to take. At least, in every bit of on-line advertising for the new cameras make it clear that there is no PC interface for them right now.

[hollowaylisa03]

Well I'm not happy with google nest right now I call for help to get me doorbell up and running again and for 2hrs went back and forth with tech cause he kept losing his internet access well the 3rd time of getting disconnected he man didn't call back now why on God Earth would you have a tech call from the Philippines that don't have go internet reception every time he called back I had to pop my camera off my doorbell and scan the code and we would like connection again this is very annoying to say the least I will be calling back tomorrow since it finally took my payment I expect to be able to use my doorbell camera. So I sure hope I have better luck tomorrow or there go on a lose a customer .

[welshdragon]

Great news @Leticia 

Would you confirm if the hot water control that is only available in the Nest app will appear in the Google home app?  

Thanks

[Mokibobi]

Hey Google, will this release be solving the issue with nest audio on stereo mode have MASSIVE 2 second delay whenever connected via Bluetooth?

[Singularity]

1. Port Nest app camera UIs and functionality to Google Home.  
2. Implement robust automation triggers.  Eg “When a person is detected at the front door camera after 10 pm, play an audio clip on my Google Home saying someone is at the front door.”

[Ats]

Lipstick on a pig. Is it a better shade of lipstick? Sure, I guess? But underneath it's still a pig. I'm really starting to regret having invested so much money in Google Nest products, because, honestly? The experience is straight up not good enough. Cheaper, no-name products at my local hardware store are providing my friends with a superior smart home experience than what I'm getting from my Google Nest products. I dunno if the devs are living in a bubble or what? Do they even realize how far behind the ball their system is??

[davefoc]

@Neil_rahmouniasked what we are missing in the Google Home interface that used to be in Nest.

For one thing Nest had a really neat method of allowing the user to select the slice of video they wanted to save. That seems to no longer be there.

Of course, the Nest interface had a nice control interface on the PC. That is gone now.

As others have mentioned, requiring two different programs to manage your old and new cameras is lame beyond belief.

I just bought a new camera because I blindly trusted Google. Google did not reward that trust.

[neil_rahmouni]

@davefoc although I agree it's not nice to have both apps, it's a transition, and one that was necessary as we had to have two apps already since literally everything in the houses were on the Google home app except the cameras.

So basically what Google did is allow us to have everything in one app, and not to have two apps installed at all times (which is basically what you said you wanted)

The real.mistake was to have the nest app in the first place, that's true. But Google is fixing this, so better let them fix everything and make everything for the better

[MplsCustomer]

@neil_rahmouni 

We have to have two apps installed at all times because we have one Google Nest Camera (Battery) that works with inferior functionality only in the Google Home app, while administration, history, and notifications for all of our other cameras and doorbells happens only in the Google Nest app or on the home.nest.com website.  Further, we cannot see our one Google Nest Camera (Battery) on home.nest.com on our computer.  And we found this out only after we purchased our Google Nest Camera (Battery) the week after Google Nest discontinued its Google Nest Outdoor Camera.  It never occurred to many of us that a new Google Nest camera would not work with the Google Nest app or the home.nest.com website and would have inferior functionality as a result.

[davefoc]

@neil_rahmouni
Thank you for the response. I am not as optimistic as you are about this situation.
Why would does controlling the camera from a PC not work? That feels more like an intentionally deleted feature to me. Why introduce the new program before it provided the same kind of features as the old program? Why not make it clear to the purchaser that features from the old program are not necessarily supported and you must use the new program with the new camera?

I get transitions. When DeWalt went to a new battery system it harmed old users. But they felt the new features possible with the new battery justified the pain to the old users. Nothing like that is going on here. Google just decided to reduce features and compatibility for no reason that is apparent. And when the reason is not apparent I am concerned about what the actual reason is and what Google's intentions actually are. I just bought my camera. I am seriously considering investigating other options and taking this camera back. Trust is a big deal to me and right now I don't trust Google's intentions with their Nest products.

[Ats]

I never even used the old nest app but I still think the current Google Home experience isn't good enough. If you think what Google Home offers in the way of function and experience is acceptable (especially if you've paid money for lots of cameras and the ongoing Aware subscription) then you must not have looked very hard at the competitors? Routines are extremely unsophisticated and lack obvious "starters" like temperature, sensor states, or even location triggers beyond "home" or "not"; the events feed is a pig-stye; we still can't filter familiar faces from notifications, and the extreme delay between the doorbell being pushed and the actual chime on the Nests makes it worthless as a bell. If we hadn't invested so much money in the ecosystem I would have jumped ship already, but we can't afford to do that and as it is we're locked in and deeply disappointed with the experience. Friends with no-name alternatives can create complex routines like "if husband leaves work send wife notification" "if wife leaves work and temperature is below X degrees turn on heat pump" "if last person leaves house and window sensor state is open then send notification" and on and on. Google Home is so unsophisticated in comparison that it's impossible to not be disappointed.

[Singularity]

@Ats what are some of these providers?  I’m ready to move on from google home despite 8 cameras, most IQ.  The current system doesn’t provide the security features I’m looking for, and I’m not convinced there is a roadmap with meaningful improvements on the horizon.  It’s a shame, there was so much potential in the Nest product line before it was gutted. 

[Ats]

If you're not afraid of tinkering, look into the free open source Home Assistant project. By far this offers the most control but may be intimidating to some people. You'll need an old NUC/Mac Mini or Raspberry Pi to run the server locally.

Homey is more user friendly with a bigger emphasis on UX but is cloud based and comes with a fee.

Both will easily integrate with almost all no-name smart home products.

If you're looking for something as straight forward as Google Home that offers more control, then that's probably Apple Homekit, but of course, the problem with this is a major ecosystem change beyond smart home stuff. If you've gone with Nest stuff you are likely also locked into other Google and Android ecosystems, both of which may be harder to divest. 

If security is your primary concern, have you looked into SimpliSafe? I'm in New Zealand so it's not available to me as a service but if I lived in the States I think it would be a no-brainer for me. I wish we had something like that here.

[Singularity]

Thanks @Ats , very helpful.  I’m mostly looking for high quality cameras with object recognition, smart automations, home/away detection, good mobile app. 

I do have a service that lets my google devices show up in HomeKit, I’ll see if that gives me more of what I’m looking for.  

[Ats]

Home Assistant will do all that and more but might take a lot of tinkering to get there

[Poyetas]

Thank you @Leticia 

The truth is the app needs a complete overhaul if you want it to work well on the real world. I don't try to be rude or to minimize the effort Google has dedicated to this product, but is too far from usable and practical. As a Domotics professional, I find a lack of much needed functionalities and lots of bugs. I will address some of those here:

 1.- It is priority to have user profiles and permission access, for a neat and safe administration  and operation of a Home. For instance: I would login as a "Pro" and create and configure all the items in the house and then pass ownership to the owner keeping all items and settings. Nowadays, if I create the house, I am able to pass ownership to another user, but as soon as I am removed of the house I created and configured, some devices and configuration are lost.  Another example is to restrict user to view some devices, and to change settings of those that they are given permission to operate. And also, you should be able to create "daughter/son" or "child" profiles without administrative privileges -like inviting other users or kicking out existing ones. (You don't want to have your teen daughter's boyfriend messing around the configuration or kicking you out of your own house's control), or a guest on a party doing the same).  So a structure with privileges and access levels by user profile like Pro->Owner->User->Guest would be great. Then allowing or restricting access by Room->Device or Group.    

2.- I have configured some routines for a Home. One of them has two triggers, either Sunrise or saying to the assistant "new day". Tis one is based on the GOOD MORNING routine that's already programmed. I found preset actions like phone volume settings, tell out loud day reminders and schedule, weather info, and some others didn't work. I also programmed Spotify to play a specific playlist in random mode, but the same voice command I use on the assistant works randomly on the Routine, working only few times. So I created all the commands as a custom actions, and found that sunrise triggered and executed only the actions related to the air conditioning, whilst the voice command triggered and executed all programmed commands. When I verified my activity (myactivity.google.com) it showed that even with the sunrise trigger, all commands were passed properly but not executed, though. Even those commands related to the phone itself (raise volume to 100%, disconnect silent, mode, read my reminders for today, etc.) are passed but not executed. It seems something to do with the phone being blocked when the sunrise command triggers the actions. This is a major bug.

3. The voice command syntax for, let's say, setting the air conditioning temperature works randonmly, since sometimes it actually sets the desired temperature while other times just returns the conversion between Celsius and Fahrenheit for the temperature you want to set.

4. Some functionality whit Spanish language commands seems to have issues related to the command language and the server language. For instance, with a system set in Spanish, a android phone configured in Spanish as well and custom commands written in Spanish with proven syntax, the activity registry shows some of them are saved in Spanish and some others are registered in English. This is weird!! Of course, none of this commands actually triggered an action, with the exception of the air conditioning commands, that are passed trough the SmartLife app

There are more bugs and fixes that need to be done to have a World Class product. I will be happy to help in case you need further information.