Lights on mini constantly pulsing

[richardtc007]

Over the past 2 weeks I've noticed that the Google Home Minis  (5 of them) throughout my house frequently have four pulsing white lights. This is not the result of someone saying anything remotely close to "Hey Google" or "Ok Google" and it is not the result of an errant broadcast. 

I've noticed that it even happens when I'm the only one home and haven't said a word.

I've done the whole unplug and reset routine. Why are they all suddenly listening???

[OI3AIVIAISBLACK]

Where do you turn that off at? I'm not finding it under Google home broadcast options

NM...I found it but it was already turned off so that's not it. Need a way to turn off broadcast reply option. That's where this issue seems to happen. It has no timeout like it use to thus all Google hub devices are stuck listening for a reply.

[Lavmoon]

Exactly!  I would rather have to tell it to broadcast to reply than have all my devices rendered useless anytime there is a broadcast!

[UpdatedtoFail]

This is still happening all over the world. Still no fix. The answer is simply "report the problem" which is insane. This is a privacy issue. How Google is not scrambling losing their minds to fix this is beyond me. Not a single one of us signed up to have these devices record constantly for hours at a time. Someone there screwed up big time.

[Daveterry]

This is not a fix, but a way to temporarily turn off the light, Say HEY GOOGLE, CANCEL, at lest if you have guests over, it wont seem like the minis are spying on them.

[UltraMagnus0001]

when I say that it turns my tv off

[CheckDaMB]

Exactly. Then everything is turned off for me (TV, lights, switches, etc.)

[Kaissandei]

Say “Hey Google Nevermind”

[fogrunner]

This was one of the first things I tried, but every time I tell it to CANCEL or STOP (flashing), it turns off the downstairs TV or music that may be playing on another speaker in another room, which the family member currently using that device doesn't appreciate. 😒

[Jovana]

I have about 15 minis and I am NOT resetting them anymore. I've had so many problems with them over the years, and had to factory reset all of them countless times. I finally gave up of trying to fix them. This latest issue is really annoying as some of the minis are in my bedroom and the brightness of the lights is disrupting my sleep. After reading this thread, I had an idea to try a command "stop pulsating". On some of them, it took a few tries but to my surprise it worked. None of them are pulsating anymore. It's been a few hours, but only time will tell if this could be a temporary solution until they hopefully fix it. 

[talljennr]

Same problem here with the blinking lights constantly.

[MsSwiftFarrow]

Same issue with my minis but also my larger home speakers.

[Afizzzzy]

Yes I also have this exact issue with the google home devices in my home.  Resetting doesn’t solve it.  Also issues with low volume and delayed broadcasts, nest doorbell also acting up, regularly going offline recently.  Thought it was because my devices are fairly old but totally hanging in here for the answers / fix now.

[CheckDaMB]

Same problem with Nest Audio, Nest Hub 2 and Mini. And nothing helps...

No reset, no rename and no move to other room ... 

Firmware: 356012

Cast Firmware: 1.56.356012

KR from Germany

[Pappahunt]

Hi. I have the same problem with all my Google devices. They are just pulsing away all day long. 

I have 2 google nest hubs, 5 Google Home, 2 google Nest Audio and one Lenovo Clock with Google. 

Other tthan the pulsing, then they have started to act weird. Broadcasting are only working on some devices. Playing spotify works rarely and turning off the lights works, but it responds with "the device is not connected" 

Can we please get a fix on this. 

[mjkadour]

Same issue here in Canada for the last 2 months,  firmware 356012.   Nothing is resolving this!!

[OI3AIVIAISBLACK]

Same issue here on any Google hub device. It seems to get stuck in broadcast reply mode. Been going on for over a month now. All the nest hub displays will show the last broadcasted message with the reply button with the screen on until we swipe it away. All the minis that are in the bedrooms, all 4 lights stay flashing so we end up just unplugging them during the night. Google should have fixed this by now or at least rollback whatever update they pushed because it's absolutely annoying and frustrating.

[CheckDaMB]

Confirm with broadcasted message!

[kellywelly150]

If you say hey 'Google stop updating' they stop for a while 

[GoHawks1225]

I have learned that unplugging just one device and plugging it back in (soft reset) temporarily fixes the broadcast bug ON ALL DEVICES. Sometimes it will last 24 hours, sometimes just a few hours.

But yes you only need to soft reset one device which leads me to believe this is 100% a Google assistant problem and not the device problem. 

[Jlbobad]

Same problem with multiple homes and home minis... 7 total.  just randomly whole hose begins to pulse with no activation.  

[LightsFlashing]

Still flashing here! Help! 

[Agent-616]

I have 5 speakers and they all have had this same issue for weeks now. 

All on the same WiFi. All have continued conversation off. 

I am based in the UK

[Lavmoon]

This is a programming issue.  There is not a stop after the broadcast.  Because it gets stuck it will not do any subsequent broadcasts.  We have been loyal Google home users for years now and have 10 speakers, 1 hub, 1 Lenovo clock, 4 chrome casts and a nest door lock.  We use it so that the blind wheelchair bound elder can have independence and yet let us know when he needs help.  We have had to let Alexa into our home because this has not been fixed.  We can not afford to be without a reliable assistant for him and hiring a person is way more expensive when we are just in the other room.  This thread has obviously not been taken seriously enough since they don't seem to realize that it is not just a listening issue.  They know that many of us with elders/disabled people/Alzeihmers and dementia patients use their devices to make that person more independent so why let this error go and put these people in possible danger?  This needs to be pushed up the IT chain so that it gets fixed.  If we really wanted Alexa we wouldn't be here trying to let them know the issue so they could troubleshoot properly.  We would just all be switching because our Google homes are broken with no fix in sight.  On the bright side since we aren't broadcasting or using routines I'm not running around the house for 30 minutes telling each device to cancel several times a day.  Yall let me know when it gets fixed but it may be awhile before I can trust it will work as expected again.

[Ematt70]

This makes sense.  About a month ago, I noticed a change in the broadcasting feature, where instead of it saying "broadcasting now", it switched to saying "broadcasting on..." and then listing off every one of my Google devices.  I've also noticed since then that the broadcasting feature doesn't work most of the time.  It says broadcasting now, but it rarely goes through on any of my Google devices.  Google, please fix this, and reach out to me if you would like to repro the issue.

[ryanseanj]

Same problem with all our Nest mini gen 2 devices.  Ask Google to do something, then it stops for a while before happening again later.

[tap_tank]

Same problem here, happening on all my smart speakers.
I have 1 x Google Home 1st Gen, 4 x Google Home Mini 1st Gen, 1 x Google Nest Mini 2nd Gen.

[korpx]

@Muddi when performing the broadcast from my mobile phone everything works as intended. The minis happily beeps, plays the broadcasted message and the lights stay off on all devices.

[buggalo77]

Another week passes and this still isn't fixed. 9 speakers and one Lenovo clock in the house. Google, get your **bleep** together and fix this!

[CheckDaMB]

Sad as it is, I assume they really have no idea how to fix it.

KR from Germany

[Lavmoon]

It may be as simple as looking at their if/else logic on the continued conversation section of their code since this is where it seems to be getting hung up.

[pHC502]

Same issue. Most of my devices are Home Mini gen 1 "pucks". All four lights pulse but there's no notification and it doesn't appear to be listening.

[Beckylew]

It's the same with mine also I have 8 in my house and they are all doing it. It's so bloody annoying 🙄 

[SCAREDEM357]

I think this may only be affecting people who have multiple devices

[Beckylew]

Still not good. They need to fix it ASAP really multiple devices or not. 

[DeadlyMoldSpore]

Of course it only affects people with multiple devices.  This is a broadcast issue.  Why would you broadcast if you only had one device?

[artisticcheese]

There is use case where you broadcast from mobile device to a speaker

[SCAREDEM357]

Originally I only had one device and I would broadcast from my phone to that one device.  Then later I bought multiple speaker devices,  one for each room. 

[casmj]

Me too - 7 minis, one Nest Audio pair, one 1st gen Home speaker. All have pulsing lights and become unresponsive until rebooted. The broadcast function was perfect before the update. Now on the rare occasion when it does work, the broadcasting speaker repeats back what it will broadcast first (sooo annoying!), and then it broadcasts.

If Google would have open-sourced this code (at least the parts that don't hold proprietary secrets - I totally get that part), then the open-source community would have caught and fixed the issue right after it was first caught.

Instead, one of the word's greatest tech companies has publicly released an update to millions of devices that continuously cripples them, and even after a full month, no resolution has been announced, no workaround issued, etc. I feel like Google is forgetting that it's customers are paying its bills - Google should take better care of us.

I'm very close to switching to Alexa.

[givemefreetv]

How is Google even allowed to continue selling these things knowing they're broken.  Where is the class-action lawsuit?  I'll be the first to sign up.

[GlassFamily]

Still having issues? Please feel free to file complaints with the Federal Communications Commission. 

Start looking for a class action attorney. Months of the Google Home devices staying in listening mode is a clear privacy violation. 

https://consumercomplaints.fcc.gov/hc/en-us/requests/new?ticket_form_id=38824