There is just something magical about turning on the lights without having to press a switch. With smart lights, you can use an app to quickly turn them on and off or even change their color. However, I prefer using audio instead.
with one of The best smart speakersJust say the name of the light or lights you want to control and Google Assistant, Alexa, or even Siri can do the rest.
Although I built my smart home around Google smart speakers, I recently got an Echo Dot after installing Smart sensor in my mailbox. Once I added the Philips Hue skill to Alexa, I now find it hard to go back to the Google Assistant to control the smart lights.
If you are building a smart home for the first time or plan to add some Best smart light bulbs For your current setup, this is an important thing to consider before choosing which virtual assistant you want to control your smart lights with.
Short responses to all your lights from any room
What struck me immediately after I tried using Alexa to control my smart lights were the short responses from Amazon’s virtual assistant. No matter what lights or even how many lights you asked me about echo dot To turn it on or off, Alexa replied with a simple “Okay.”
This is a sharp contrast to Google Assistant’s long responses. If you ask someone The best Google Home smart speakers To say, “Turn off the kitchen lights,” they respond with “Okay, six lights out.” This may be different for you depending on how many lights there are in each room but you get the idea. Not only is it an exceptionally long response but Google Assistant also says a lot of unnecessary information.
On the other hand, Alexa keeps things short and sweet no matter what lights you ask to turn off. This is great at night also because you won’t disturb your other family members. There are two ways around this when using Google Assistant but I prefer ‘okay’ from Alexa as the default response. However, there is a downside, as you won’t know if Alexa messed up and accidentally turned off the faulty lights.
Hear ringing instead but only in the same room
If you’re tired of hearing the Google Assistant say the name of every light that turns it off, you need to be more mindful about which room in the house you’re in when you ask for the lights out.
In an update released in 2019, Google changed how its virtual assistant responds when you’re in the same room as the lights you want to turn off. Now, if you’re in the living room and ask to turn off the living room lights, you’ll hear a chime instead.
While this change certainly makes a difference, it still isn’t convenient to control the lights. Oftentimes, I may be in a room and want to turn on the lights in another room that I will then move into. In this case, Google Assistant will still say “OK” or “sure” along with the number of lights. Meanwhile, Alexa will only say “okay” when you turn off any of your smart lights.
Custom actions as a semi-alternative solution
For those who want to continue using the Google Assistant instead of switching to Alexa, custom actions can help silence the search giant’s default assistant once and for all. However, you will have to spend some time preparing it.
To do this, open the Google Home app and tap the purple “Routines” button at the top. Here you will find many preset personal routines that you can customize or you can click the plus button in the lower right corner to create your own routine. this is support document (Opens in a new tab) Outlines everything you need to know in case you’re having trouble creating your own routines.
At the bottom of each series, there is an option to choose an “Audio Device”. Tap on it and scroll down bypassing all the smart speakers, you can select “No audio device.” This way, you won’t hear anything after the Google Assistant has done your routine. This is not an ideal solution but it may be a last resort if you are tired of hearing Google Assistant.
Using Alexa and Google Assistant side by side
Because I invested a lot in Google’s smart home ecosystem and enjoy watching YouTube videos or even feeds from my security cameras on my Nest Hub MaxI plan to use Google and Amazon smart speakers and smart displays in tandem from now on.
If I’m in the same room of lights that I want to control, I’ll use Google Assistant. This also allows you to say things like “lights out” to control the lights in just one room. However, if I’m in a hurry and want to have the lights I need ready to go when I walk into a room, I’ll use my Echo Dot or even a new one. Echo Show 8 picked up during Amazon Prime Day.
It’s not a perfect solution by any means but one thing I’ve learned from my time testing many The best smart home devices is that you have to be flexible if you want your smart home to really shine. Maybe Google will constantly fix things, but for now, I’m just going to have to put up with having two smart home ecosystems living side by side in my house.
More Tom’s guide: You can also check How I turned an old monitor into a digital dashboard And the How I synced my smart lights to my TV and it blew me away.
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