The best smart speakers: Google Home vs Amazon Echo

Smart speakers are more becoming more and more common in daily life: they read us recipes, give us personal daily updates, let us watch YouTube videos on TV, or dim the bedroom lights for us. Today, speech tech­nol­o­gy is digital, networked, and in­ter­ac­tive. What makes smart speakers special is that they aim to unite all available personal data, digital services, and domestic services in a central control system. They become the new interface between man and tech­nol­o­gy.

While digital as­sis­tants like Siri (Apple) or Cortana (Microsoft) are primarily used as or­ga­ni­za­tion­al tools, “external” smart speakers go a step further: As in­de­pen­dent devices primarily designed for the home, they network the owner’s digital life to their home. The speech function of these speakers make the tech­nol­o­gy more human, the AI elements make it more in­tel­li­gent, and the smart home net­work­ing makes your home more com­fort­able. This market was opened by Amazon, but now Google is joining the race.

Google Home and Amazon Echo are syn­ony­mous with being the best home smart speakers on the market. When Google Home was launched in the US in May 2016, it seemed almost like a carbon copy of Amazon’s Echo. Nev­er­the­less, Google was able to score points with their huge knowledge base right from the start. Google Home has now moved even closer to their biggest com­peti­tor, thanks to extensive updates rolled out about a year later. In this article, we will discuss the most important aspects when buying a smart speaker, and compare their re­spec­tive features in detail.

What are the qualities that make up a good smart speaker? What should you look out for when searching for the perfect one? When making your choice, the most important element is high sound quality, a powerful voice technique, and appealing design. These things together form the device’s user interface and will influence how much you end up in­ter­act­ing with the speaker. However, the entire product really hangs on per­for­mance aspects.

Depending on what you will be using the device for, its ability to answer everyday questions is crucial: how reliable is the speaker’s reaction to questions about the weather, the traffic situation, or general facts? Smart speakers could end up eclipsing smart­phones, at least in terms of domestic use: Ask your question out loud and the om­ni­scient speaker will reply promptly. It is worth your while, however, to ensure that your device has a knowledge of databases and reliable voice recog­ni­tion.

Those who want to get the most out of their smart speakers should also pay attention to how much they co­or­di­nate with third-party programs: which music streaming services are supported? Do they have links to delivery services or shopping portals? There is a long line of service providers that see promising platforms in Google Home and Amazon Echo as a way to increase the pop­u­lar­i­ty of their own apps. What this means for the user is more skills and options for your device.

For many people, the thought of these devices is still very fu­tur­is­tic: the smart home, or the Internet of Things. But technical de­vel­op­ments in our lifestyles are what products like Echo or Google Home are aiming to work with. That is why Google and Amazon are working with numerous providers from the smart home sector, creating networks for their smart speakers with other ap­pli­ances such as central heating, a dish washer, or a TV. Having these ca­pa­bil­i­ties also in­flu­ences the func­tion­al diversity of their products.

Last but not least, it is very important how well the device functions as a personal assistant. Smart speakers are busy bees in terms of or­ga­ni­za­tion: they integrate calendars, to-do lists, and reminders. They collect a lot of data about their users, which makes them even more re­spon­sive to them. For example, smart speakers in the US can already recognize their users by their voices: a speaker can dif­fer­en­ti­ate between the voices of different family members and au­to­mat­i­cal­ly play their favorite music or give them their personal day briefing.

Echo and Home are the undis­put­ed market leaders among smart speakers and are in direct com­pe­ti­tion with each other. As the first smart speaker available for purchase, Amazon Echo secured a large market share. The cor­po­ra­tion maintains this lead because they suc­cess­ful­ly advertise the product in their own shopping portal.

Con­sid­er­ing the head start already taken by Amazon, Google took an as­ton­ish­ing amount of time in the USA and abroad to launch their Home product. The economic market for smart speakers is therefore dominated by the Amazon Echo. But is it really a better product? Here we compare the most important functions of both speakers and identify their strengths and weak­ness­es.

When you compare the most important features of the Amazon Echo and Google Home, you can see how balanced their ad­van­tages and dis­ad­van­tages are. This makes it all the more important to really do your research on both products before choosing one. The more details you have, the easier it will be to make the right choice.

The Amazon Echo smart speaker comes in the form of a high cylinder, with a large speaker on the lower half of the device. Echo is available in black and white, with a blue ring of light activated in the upper half when the voice function is activated. The device has two manual options: the button can be used to turn off the mi­cro­phone, and another is a mul­ti­func­tion button.

Google Home does not differ sig­nif­i­cant­ly from the Echo, but it is somewhat squatter, more bel­liger­ent, and has a less discreet loud­speak­er. Moreover, Home only weighs about half of the Amazon Echo. The lower half of the unit is available in different colors and materials (black, gray, copper), while the upper part is always made of white, hard plastic. The only visible button is the mi­cro­phone; other manual commands are recorded via a touch-sensitive interface.

There are dif­fer­ences in terms of taste, but the general opinions found in IT magazines and ex­pe­ri­ence reports fall in favor of Google Home. The unit is smaller, lighter, and offers more design options. Overall, however, both products are so pared back in their optics that both the Amazon Echo and Google Home can easily be in­te­grat­ed into every household.

In terms of language and speaking functions, which are really the crux of smart speakers, there are smaller but notable dif­fer­ences. Just like the speakers’ technical aspects, Google Home’s voice data is projected through two mi­cro­phones, while Amazon’s Echo has seven sound sensors, which are also able to filter out back­ground noise.

The speech recog­ni­tion aspect works somewhat better for the Echo; it is more reliable at dis­tin­guish­ing its owners’ voice over any back­ground din. In a neutral situation, both devices are equally good for users, they both react promptly to queries at distances of up to 15 meters and respond to inquiries. Both devices are also always ready to be woken up and activated using their code word – “OK Google” or “Echo”.

There are also small dif­fer­ences to be noticed in the sound quality. If you want to play music directly with the devices rather than con­nect­ing to external speakers, Google Home offers a fuller, more rounded sound. However, Google’s AI voice sounds a bit more me­chan­i­cal than the Echo’s AI voice, and Google Home’s volume capacity is a few decibels lower than Echo’s.

When it comes to language in­tel­li­gi­bil­i­ty, Google is winning the race: Although Home is still newer to the market, its voice AI has much better con­ver­sa­tion­al ca­pa­bil­i­ty because it remembers con­ver­sa­tions and can keep up with follow-up questions. On the other hand, the Echo still has problems un­der­stand­ing simple questions. Ad­di­tion­al­ly, the Echo is not always able to formulate answers that are gram­mat­i­cal­ly correct. Google Home’s advantage over Amazon’s Echo is hardly sur­pris­ing, con­sid­er­ing that Google is deeply invested in spoken language com­pre­hen­sion research.

Nev­er­the­less, language in­tel­li­gi­bil­i­ty varies depending on the subject area. While Google Home answers general knowledge questions and in­for­ma­tion reliably, the Echo deals better with questions about pur­chas­ing and products. Both devices revise and improve speech recog­ni­tion on a regular basis. To summarize: The Echo has better hearing ca­pa­bil­i­ties, and Home has better com­pre­hen­sion.

Both devices are sur­pris­ing­ly small en­ter­tain­ment boxes that can send YouTube videos to your TV screen or play your favorite songs. Amazon Echo can play from music streaming services like Amazon Music, Prime Music, TuneIn, or Spotify. The Echo can activate your radio trans­mit­ter of choice on request, and can also access mobile devices or private music col­lec­tions using a Bluetooth con­nec­tion. The device is also com­pat­i­ble with Amazon Fire TV and can com­pre­hend in­struc­tions involving YouTube or Netflix. Something that Google Home lacks: the Echo can play au­dio­books through the Audible app upon request.

Google Home does not differ enor­mous­ly from Echo in terms of ca­pa­bil­i­ty, but it does integrate Google Play Music and Google Chrome­cast instead of offering Amazon’s streaming services. If you already have a Google Chrome­cast device, Google Home will be a better choice for you – Google devices com­mu­ni­cate fairly seam­less­ly with one another, which really extends Google Home’s mul­ti­me­dia features.

Google Home does however have one major dis­ad­van­tage: the speaker is not Bluetooth enabled, so loud­speak­er boxes can only be attached using a cable con­nec­tion. Although cable con­nec­tions are ad­mit­ted­ly more reliable, it is still a sig­nif­i­cant reduction in the device’s flex­i­bil­i­ty, es­pe­cial­ly when compared to the Amazon Echo. Google Home still has ways to go to catch up with the Echo in terms of mul­ti­me­dia.

Overall, Amazon Echo does offer more third-party features than Google Home, and the number of Amazon part­ner­ships with external parties is growing. Amazon Echo currently provides access to over 15,000 skills (skills are their term for voice-based ap­pli­ca­tions), ranging from con­trol­ling home ap­pli­ca­tions to ordering an Uber, keeping up with your Fitbit, or ordering a pizza from Domino’s.

The Echo has earned its place, par­tic­u­lar­ly in the smart home sector: unlike the younger Google Home, the Echo has been expanding its col­lab­o­ra­tions over the years and now has a long line of smart home services that enable the Amazon device to activate lights, regulate heating, start up the vacuum cleaner, or com­mu­ni­cate with radio sockets or the dish­wash­er. Google Home, however, does integrate the most popular Smart Home providers – including Phillips Hue, Nest and Samsung Smart­Things – but they still have a long way to go before they catch up with the Echo.

Still, it can be assumed that Google Home will catch up in this area. As pre­vi­ous­ly mentioned, if you already have a Google Chrome­cast system connected to the TV, your Home device can interact with it. In­struc­tions like “Ok Google, play ‘The Simpsons’ on the TV in the kitchen” run smoothly.

The Echo and the Home have many personal assistant functions in common: both create calendar entries and to-do lists, read messages, and create personal day briefings. Google Home has a slight upper-hand in being able to create a more complex profile of its users through access to giant data sets like Google Search in Gmail. Google is also known for its com­pli­cat­ed search al­go­rithms and its technical lead in the field of ar­ti­fi­cial in­tel­li­gence. Google Home also benefits from this tech­no­log­i­cal capital, but users would hardly notice this in their day to day use of the device. Almost all in­ves­tiga­tive reports agree that in terms of prac­ti­cal­i­ty, Amazon Echo does not lag sig­nif­i­cant­ly behind Google Home.

Both IT giants make use of their back­ground business know-how: Google Home scores points as an in­tel­li­gent knowledge assistant, while Amazon Echo wins as a versatile consumer assistant. Including the overall strengths of your business makes sense, because after all, smart speakers bring together a lot of different functions packed into one device. Amazon and Google’s industry expertise are reflected in the strengths of their language as­sis­tants.

Amazon uses its language assistant to focus on dis­trib­ut­ing consumer goods online. As a global shopping empire, Amazon has a strong dis­tri­b­u­tion network and knows its users’ con­sump­tion needs extremely well. This expertise is optimized by Amazon for the Echo, as confirmed by all test results which show that it provides accurate shopping and product in­for­ma­tion. In the US, where everyday goods are ordered online, the Echo has a clear com­pet­i­tive advantage.

Amazon also make use of their expertise in online sales in other areas. From the outset, the company has pursued a strategy of opening its smart speakers’ potential by net­work­ing with as many third parties as possible, to provide easy access to consumer goods and services. The Amazon Echo is strongly oriented towards the outside world and has been ac­cu­mu­lat­ing a steadily growing number of part­ner­ships and skills to make it at­trac­tive to consumers. Among them are popular mul­ti­me­dia platforms, order or in­for­ma­tion services.

This is es­pe­cial­ly no­tice­able in the smart home sector. The Amazon Echo plays an important role in this area: The devices are offered and purchased through the Amazon store, and once the Echo is set up in the home, it functions as the central control system for all smart home functions.

Ad­van­tages:

• Reliable speech recog­ni­tion, even in the case of auxiliary noises
• Speaks fluently with a natural voice
• Bluetooth con­nec­tion with loud­speak­ers or other devices is possible
• Good selection of shopping providers
• Reliable shopping and product in­for­ma­tion
• Many third-party col­lab­o­ra­tions and a wide range of “skills”
• Versatile product for use with a smart home system

Dis­ad­van­tages:

• Re­stric­tions when im­ple­ment­ing search al­go­rithms: questions about general facts or in­for­ma­tion are not always answered reliably
• Re­stric­tions on language in­tel­li­gi­bil­i­ty: response to follow-up questions and for­mu­lat­ing gram­mat­i­cal­ly correct sentences is still somewhat prob­lem­at­ic

Google Home has a different focus to the Amazon Echo. The product is geared towards natural com­mu­ni­ca­tion and building knowledge of its users’ personal pref­er­ences. The technical foun­da­tion for Google Home, Google Assistant, was designed to provide a com­plete­ly in­di­vid­ual user ex­pe­ri­ence using AI tech­nol­o­gy. Google’s expertise lets Google Home per­son­al­ize answers, which is very ad­van­ta­geous in the long run. After all, as a user, you want natural, personal com­mu­ni­ca­tion with your assistant. Google Home is already profiting from its language in­tel­li­gence ca­pa­bil­i­ties, which are con­stant­ly being developed es­pe­cial­ly for Google Search. The in­tel­li­gent speech function is a big advantage for Google Home. Google Home is also well-liked for its general knowledge – and it makes ample use of the company’s back­ground as a search engine. Google Home is excellent at handling questions about general knowledge and in­for­ma­tion: see a test with 45 questions, conducted by Forbes, which shows Google’s smart speaker to be the clear winner. In recent tests, they seem to be doing even better. Anyone who is looking to stay regularly informed from the comfort of their couch and would like to have short con­ver­sa­tions with their smart speaker will be satisfied with Google’s product. Ad­van­tages:

• Choice of design options
• Wide sound range thanks to the built-in speaker
• High speech in­tel­li­gi­bil­i­ty and reliable response to con­nec­tion requests
• Complex AI tech­nol­o­gy and proven user pref­er­ence
• Good im­ple­men­ta­tion of knowledge databases, reliable in­for­ma­tion

Dis­ad­van­tages:

• Limited range of skills and features
• Co­op­er­ates with only the most important smart home providers
• No Bluetooth con­nec­tiv­i­ty
• Higher level of data pro­tec­tion by net­work­ing with other Google services

Google Home vs. Amazon Echo – ul­ti­mate­ly, it is up to you to decide which language assistant features are most important to you. This is the only way to find out what smart speaker will be the most suitable for you. Here is a tabular overview of the most important aspects of the Echo and the Home: