Gemini on phones is pretty quick to reply to your queries. However, on smart home devices, even a second feels like an eternity, especially when controlling them through voice. For frequently used comments, you expect the assistant to respond instantly. To get closer to that goal, Google has updated Gemini for Home to ensure it responds significantly faster to common smart home queries.
Anish Kattukaran, Chief Product Officer of Gemini for Home, Google Home and Nest, announced in a post on X that a new Gemini for Home update drastically reduces the latency for common smart home commands. Additionally, the underlying changes have also led to error rates dropping significantly across the board.
As a result, Gemini on your Google Home device should be about 30–40% faster at responding to common commands like “turn off the lights.” The lower latency should also make interactions with your smart home feel a lot snappier and instantaneous.
Google says it has finished rolling out the major under-the-hood update. So, if you have access to Gemini on your Google Home device, you should see the faster response times for “hundreds” of common smart home commands. Hopefully, the lower latency has a visible impact in real-world use and makes the whole Gemini for Home experience feel more instant.
Gemini for Home is currently only available through an Early Access program in the US and Canada. It’s invite-only, so you must apply to join the program.
Gemini for Home keeps getting better
This is the second major improvement Google has released for Gemini for Home this week. At the beginning of the month, it rolled out multiple improvements, including better isolating multiple homes, improved categorization of devices based on their names, fewer cutoffs while speaking, and smarter use of your saved home address as context for answering questions like “What’s the weather?” or when providing local news updates.
Google took its time bringing Gemini to Google Home devices, and even now, it remains limited to an Early Access program. However, to the company’s credit, it has been steadily fixing reported bugs and rolling out improvements to refine the overall experience.
