Google Assistant can already control a vast number of smart home and Internet of Things products, among other electronics, and that list has just grown a little more. As of today, the same Google Assistant that you’ll find on your phone, Android Wear 2.0 watches, and Google Home, can now link to smart home devices from the likes of Best Buy Insignia, LIFX, TP-Link and Wink. Things like fans, routers, AC systems, appliances, and lights, all fall under these companies’ purview, along with a huge number of other such products. Integrating with these brands brings the total number of smart home product makers that Google Home can link to well into the double digits.
Nest, Philips Hue, and Samsung SmartThings were among some of the first major IoT product makers to jump on board with Google Assistant thanks to Google Home, and were soon joined by Belkin, Wemo, and Honeywell. Naturally, integration with Tasker and IFTTT has been on board for a while now, meaning that just about any smart home or IoT device can be controlled with enough tinkering. With the select OEMs listed above and a few others, Google has added in complete integration from the ground up, making it easy for customers to get these devices working “out of the box”. Naturally, these partnerships cover future devices from supported OEMs as well, and the list of supported OEMs is only going to grow over time.
Just about any phone with Google Assistant will feature Home Control options; on a phone, these can be found from the three-dot menu that can be accessed with a tap on the top right of the Google Assistant popup. That menu will allow you to integrate with just about any compatible IoT device that’s on the same network as your phone, and from there, you should be able to control said devices through the Home Control menu or by voice with Google Assistant on any compatible device that you sign your Google account into, so long as Google Assistant is present. This integration will run side by side with any shoehorned integration that a user has made in the past, such as through IFTTT or Tasker.