iPhone has Siri, a voice assistant that acts accordingly with your commands although it has certain limitations. Similarly, Amazon has its own assistant Alexa and Microsoft has Cortana but Google assistant is arguably the best voice-activated virtual companion as of now.
Google Now was the original application that later transformed into what we see of the virtual assistant. With a natural speaking format combined with the search power of Google, it comes out to be one of the most refined assistants that you can rely on to get you through your day.
It launched in May 2016 as a part of the Google Smart messaging app Allo. Shortly after that Google Assistant made its jump to Google Pixel phones and then the company brought it to Google Home and Wear OS. Not long after that, other phones running on Android started to receive it too via OTA updates from their OEMs.
From keeping you organized in your routine to telling you jokes and playing games with you, Google assistant is a complete package of a helpful companion that you can get in your smartphone.
How to Use Google Assistant
If you are new to this and haven’t set up the assistant yet on your device, press and hold the home button and it will startup. You have to register your voice with the assistant by saying “OK Google” three times so that the assistant responds to you whenever you say the command.
The next time you want to talk to your virtual assistant, you just need to say OK Google and it will get activated and be ready to help you or answer any question you ask it.
What Can You Do with Google Assistant
There are practically a ton of features and tasks that your virtual companion can perform for you but we have just listed the most interesting ones here.
Take Advice on Where to Eat or Hangout
So it’s the weekend and you are out with your friends but absolutely clueless about where to have your dinner? Worry not! Your virtual companion has got your back on this. All you have to do is just ask something like “Show me nearby restaurants” or “Where should I eat” and it will provide you with a list of options which you can avail yourself at that moment depending upon what kind of food you are in the mood for.
Tell Your Assistant to Remember
If you are a person that easily forgets about things, Google Assistant is here to help you with that. You can tell it anything to remember and it will. For example, if you want it to remember that your car keys are in the drawer, just say “remember that my car keys are in the drawer” and whenever you want to retrieve the info just ask “what did I tell you” and it will divulge the info that you fed to it.
Customize Your News Feed
Launch Google Assistant by pressing and holding the home button or by saying “OK Google”. Tap the software home button at the top right corner. Select three dots and head to settings. Under the settings, go to the News section, where you will see a list of sources from where your assistant gathers and delivers news to you.
You can add more sources of your choice so that you always remain updated with the latest happenings around you. Just say something like “listen to the news” or “play the news”.
Enjoy Your Daily Subscriptions
It can provide you with daily subscriptions so the information waits for you on your device’s home screen each day. To activate this you need to install Allo, the Google Messaging app. Open the app and ask Google assistant “What can you do”? It will provide you with a number of tasks that it can perform.
Tap on subscriptions and it will prompt you with a list of subscriptions. Besides news and weather, you can also subscribe to your daily dose of jokes, poems, fun facts or funny videos, or music videos.
Set Important Reminders and Alarms
Do you always keep forgetting about a certain task that you need to be reminded of? Google Assistant is here to rescue you from any worrisome consequence. You can ask it to set a reminder for anything important. You just have to say “OK Google, Set a reminder for (whatever you want to set the reminder for)” and it’s done! It will sync with your calendar and will remind you of anything that you tell it to.
Other than that, you can also use it to set alarms so that you may never get late to work after a good night’s sleep. Just ask your assistant to “set an alarm for 6 am” or “wake me up at 6 am” and it will be done right away.
Calculate Instantly
Not every one of us is good at Maths and with Google assistant in your access, you don’t need to be. Just rely on your virtual companion to add things up for you. You can just ask “OK Google, tell me what is 250 divided by 5” and it will provide you with the answer in a jiffy so you won’t have to go for your built-in calculator app again.
Play a Game with Google Assistant
Whenever you are buried in work and don’t have any time to entertain yourself, you can rely on your assistant to divert your attention from the stress. Among many entertaining things like telling jokes and narrating poems, it can also play games with you to lift up your strain.
You can just say something similar to “play games with me” or “play games” and it will give you an array of games from which you can choose one of your likings. Be it solitaire or a quick tic-tac-toe game, you can always rely on your assistant.
An Instant Translator at Your Disposal
One of the most interesting features of Google Assistant is the capability to translate languages instantly. It can translate into 188 different languages. You can ask “How to say Thank you in Spanish” or “What is dinner called in French” and it will translate the specific word for you. You can also translate whole sentences using the same technique.