TL;DR
- Google recently launched a new Home Brief feature for Google Home that summarizes daily home activity using camera footage.
- Some early users say the feature isn’t functioning accurately, reporting ghost sightings and misidentifying animals and objects.
- The feature is still in early access and costs $10/month as part of Google’s Home Premium plan.
Google recently rolled out a major update to Google Home. Home Brief is one of the new Gemini-powered features that arrived with that update. It’s designed to give users a quick overview of their day by automatically identifying key household events and summarizing hours of footage into a short, easy-to-digest recap. The idea sounds promising, but it appears the feature isn’t working the way it should for everyone.
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A Reddit user recently shared a screenshot of their Home Brief, which summarized multiple instances of someone walking into their living room, sitting on a recliner, and returning later in the evening. However, according to the user, no one had been home for the entire 24-hour period. Commenters quickly joked that the home might be haunted.
Others chimed in with similar experiences of Home Brief frequently misidentifying objects and animals. One user wrote, “The recaps are pretty bad at the moment. I have a lot of raccoon notifications that are pretty obviously cats on my nightly reports.”
Another user reported similar misclassifications: “My AI detects a dog being walked across the street as a person on my porch. Cameras in my house detect a car driving by at night with its lights on, as a person moving in the room.”
Meanwhile, one user said that even when Home Brief tries to offer detailed descriptions, it gets some parts wrong. “It’ll give inaccurate descriptions like — a white Tesla Model 3 arrived in the driveway just after 5:05 PM, with a person quickly exiting to pick up an item from the front door before driving away — it was not a Tesla Model 3, it was a Toyota Corolla lol,” they said, adding that they expect accuracy to improve as the system learns from more data.
Not everyone had complaints, though. Several users praised the accuracy of the feature. “I got mine, and it’s telling me some of the make and model of cars that came and went. It was spot on and quite impressive,” said a happy user.
Another user shared mixed feelings, “Mine have been pretty accurate, but after that first day I turned off the interior cameras because getting summaries of what me and my wife did during the day seemed invasive.”
One more user added, “Got my first brief last night and it was spot on for the entire day’s events, it recapped. Then it had the video clips underneath it that were related to the brief.”
Overall, it looks like Home Brief is a feature that’ll improve in accuracy as more and more people start using Gemini for Home. It is currently available only in early access, which likely explains its inconsistent performance. While it shows potential as a helpful home-monitoring tool, it’s clear Google still has work to do. The feature is part of Home Premium, a $10-per-month subscription that also includes Ask Home and Gemini Live integration with Nest speakers.
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