Google Assistant starts arriving on devices from today – US first, Australia and more countries to follow

After announcing an expansion of Google Assistant earlier this week, Google has announced via YouTube that the rollout will begin today.

Posting a YouTUbe video to announced the expansion, Google said ‘Meet your #GoogleAssistant. Your own personal, helpful Google right on your phone. Rolling out to Android M and N phones starting today’. Google announced that the US will be seeing Google Assistant first, but would roll out further to Australia, Canada, the UK and Germany soon after.

The Google Assistant will be arriving on phones running Android M or N, as long as Google Play Services is up to date, but that shouldn’t be a problem for most.

To activate Google Assistant, at least once it’s arrived, you simply hold down the home key and the Assistant will pop up, then you can start talking with the Assistant where it can perform tasks, or answer questions such as:

• What’s my confirmation number for my London flight?
• Take me to Museu Picasso.
• Show my photos of sunsets in Tahoe.
• Do I need an umbrella today?
• Turn on the living room lights.

Google needs more people using Assistant to improve the AI through their machine learning and expanding to a readily available user base such as this is a good move – plus people have been asking for access for some time.

We’ll see Google Assistant in the next few days, or more likely early next week, so if you have a compatible phone, keep your eye out and let us know when you see Google Assistant on your device.