Nest Mini - children's own account without their own phone

[benbyrne1980]

Hi,

I got my kids, 10, 7 and 6, 2 Nest Minis for their rooms for Christmas. I want to set them up on Family Link as their own devices to allow suitable content filtering. I've created a couple of Google accounts for the oldest in each room, added those on Family Link, then go to their profile, go to settings, click on Google Assistant, click add that person to a new device, it says 'No Wi-Fi Connection'. The wifi is definitely working. This is on my Pixel 5 phone that is running latest software, same happens on my wife's Pixel 5.

Can this be fixed? Can I associate their Nest Mini devices with their own profiles without each of them having their own phone - that's not going to happen for a few years.

Help!

Thanks,

Ben

[GothamNY]

Hi @benbyrne1980 yes, they all will need their own phone if you want to set things up properly. As is it now the speakers are linked to your account and any one of them can walk up to a speaker and ask for anything as far as content is concerned, including music and weather. The only thing they won't have access to are those things associated with your personal results: calendar, contact, reminders, etc.

Individual accounts work only in conjunction with a phone because the settings for the device and family link all flow through controlling their access to content, which flows from speaker, device/Home app/cloud then back to the speaker. They won't need phones but they will at least need a handheld or tablet that is associated with THEIR email. Then your family link lockdown controls their device which in turn restricts what kind of requests can flow out and what requests can flow in and down to the speaker as well as what time of day or any specified time period access is restricted.

I'm guessing on how it actually works since Google doesn't share such things, but you get the picture, I hope.

[benbyrne1980]

Hi @GothamNY

Thanks for the advice. I have an old Android tablet (Nexus 10) that I could potentially use of it still works. If I set this up, do you know if it can be associated with multiple accounts?

If I set it up with at least one account, can that account then associate with its own Nest and Spotify account, so they can play their own music in their own room, and I can use my Spotify account elsewhere?

I do think it is really poor from Google not to allow this functionality without my kids having their own phones or Android tablets. It should be easy to set up each Nest with individual children's profiles and link those to additional Spotify accounts, they're missing a great opportunity by not supporting this functionality.

Thanks,

Ben

[GothamNY · Accepted solution]

Hey again, you can use one device, and put two different accounts and the kids will have to switch between accounts. I don't know about your kids, but it will probably become a fight over the remote control I used to have with my siblings. An old phone would work too if you have one around.

For kids to use their own profiles on Spotify you will need to have a family account with Spotify. It's the only way multiple streams with different music are allowed. See my post here and subsequent links in that post that generally explain why that works for further explanation.

[Jake]

Hey benbyrne1980,

I wanted to check in and see if you are still in need of any help? Please let me know if you still have any questions about the Nest Mini's, as I would be happy to assist you further. 

Best regards,
Jake

[Jake]

Hey benbyrne1980,

Please let me know if you have any questions from here about the device, as I will be locking the thread in 24 hours due to inactivity. 

Best regards,
Jake

[Jake]

Hey benbyrne1980,

It has been a few days since the last reply, and I am going to lock the thread at this time. If you have any questions, please feel free to create a new post. 

Best regards,
Jake