The recent update to Google Assistant was full of interesting and useful new features, but like any of these updates we had no idea if some would arrive here. One of the more useful features, Broadcast Replies, has now started rolling out here in Australia.
Broadcast replies arrival is advertised by the Google Home speakers after a Broadcast message has been played, saying ‘By the way if you’d like to send a reply just let me know’.
To reply, all you have to do is say ‘Ok/Hey Google, reply’ and then tell it your reply. The reply is sent back to the original broadcaster as a popup notification which you can tap on to open the Assistant, at which point a card is displayed with the audio which can be played back, or you can tap the reply button to send either a voice message or type out a reply that’s then broadcast.
Here’s how it works:
Quite frankly, this is awesome. I’ve been using the Broadcast feature while working nights to tell my son it’s time to go to bed, now he’ll actually be able to reply and that’s rather exciting. It can be used in a more helpful manner when going shopping, or perhaps replying back when someone is on their way home to tell them to pick up some milk etc.
It’s a useful feature and one I’m glad is rolling out here in Australia.
Cam, look at the Lenovo smart display.. Does duo calls and sounds better than home hub
Cam, it’s a strange decision to not have camera on the most 2nd most expensive Google home device.
Also, I wish the Telco will work with Google to let us make speaker calls on the Google home through the phones, like in USA and Canada!
Would be better if they just let phones and homes use duo to make voice calls to each other rather than just the home hub displays (which ironically don’t have cameras).
Yep you can broadcast away from your wifi network and even play music away from it too just request to play music on the speaker it’s called
Wait, you can broadcast from your phone while away from home? And this new feature lets them reply back to your phone? I was just thinking it was between google homes, so it wouldnt broadcast replies to all your google homes, just to the original broadcaster.
It broadcasts the reply just to the originator. Their replies are broadcast to all Google Homes. Not ideal, but still awesome