- The Google Home spring update is rolling out to all users outside of the early access program
- The Nest app has a renewed interface and new navigation tools
- Google has also expanded its automation capabilities into security monitoring, device monitoring, and more.
Google Home is supercharging its smart home experience with the release of its spring update, which includes improved Nest Cam app tools and enhanced automation capabilities, both of which are now available to all users after being locked in the early access program for a few months.
It’s a powerful update just to the Nest app interface, which now lets you watch the live video player while scrolling through your video history, but its smooth navigation improvements are where it really stands out.
Have you ever been frustrated by Nest app lags? That’s about to change. In addition to the updated video player, Google has given its timeline a much-needed refresh with smoother frame rates for the camera and quick search buttons that let you skip forward and back 10 seconds in video recordings.
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The company has also improved its insights features with new updates powered by Gemini to ensure a more efficient experience, starting with expanded animated previews that let you see an action or movement at a quick glance.
Video filtering options have also been improved, meaning you can organize your list of video events by specific categories, such as Person Seen, Package Seen, Glass Break Heard, or Activity Zone, while the new timeline view gives you event descriptions, making it easier to identify specific events in your video history.
As for facial recognition capabilities, the Google Home app will automatically exclude low-quality image examples to “maintain a clean and effective face library,” as Google’s summary says. Additionally, the company has implemented feedback buttons for previews of familiar faces, allowing you to report back to Google to ensure more accurate facial detection over time.
However, it’s not just the new Nest Cam devices that are getting special treatment. Nest camera models prior to 2021 will also receive Gemini event descriptions and expanded previews.
It’s a great update, to say the least, but you should keep in mind that you’ll need a Google Home Premium subscription to take full advantage of some of these tools. But this is just the tip of the iceberg: Google is also updating automations to provide a more convenient smart home experience.
‘Turn on the coffee maker at 8 in the morning’
Automations in Google Home are designed to make your smart home ecosystem even more efficient, and after listening to user feedback, Google is rolling out even more customizable automations for security monitoring, lighting control, cleaning and appliances, device status alerts, and media and entertainment.
For example, automations can now tell you what state your door is in, whether closed, ajar, stuck or forced open, giving you a more accurate view of your home even when you’re away, and the same applies to displaying the position percentage of your smart blinds.
If you have a large number of devices in your setup, such as coffee machines, washing machines, or robotic vacuum cleaners, you can now create automations that target specific operational controls to start, stop, pause, and resume the activity. Not only that, you can be more precise in controlling your lighting settings by using on/off switches to manage light effects and change the color temperature of your devices.
Like the Nest camera updates, there’s a lot to unpack with the automation features, and you can see the full list of what’s new on the Google announcement page, along with sample prompts to help you get started optimizing your smart home setup.
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