Google replaces Assistant with Gemini on Pixel 9 phones

Google is continuing to push its AI platform into more places, and to solidify that, it’s making Gemini the default smart assistant on Pixel 9 phones.

If you’re confused, you’re not alone. Google has never been great with branding, and the various forms of Gemini don’t make it any easier to understand.

• Gemini — Free AI assistant you can type/talk or share photos with
• Gemini Advanced — Paid AI assistant with more knowledge with which you can type/talk or share photos.
• Gemini Live — a feature of Gemini Advanced that allows you to have natural human-like conversations with the digital
• assistant
• Google Assistant — The standard Google chatbot you have used on most Android phones and Google/Nest smart home products

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, we can better explain today’s news.

All Pixel 9 phones will come out of their boxes with Gemini as the default assistant. Since all the phones come with a free year of Gemini Advanced, you can also set that up and take advantage of its enhanced capabilities, including the smart-looking Gemini Live. Notably, you can also use Gemini Live via Google’s new Pixel Buds to talk with Google’s virtual assistant like Joaquin Phoenix in Her.

After your first year, you need to pay for Gemini Advanced (there is no yearly sub), and monthly, it costs $26.99, adding up to $324 per year. Gemini Advanced also comes with 2TB of cloud storage, which on its own, costs $14 per month or $140 per year.

• While it makes some sense for Google to push its newest AI assistant to Pixel 9 series owners, this rollout feels a little premature since Gemini hasn’t adopted all of the skills that made Google Assistant so useful. That said, the company has shared that it plans to roll out extensions so you can use Gemini with Keep, Tasks and Utilities in the coming weeks. The company also shared that it’s revamping its YouTube Music integration to make it even smarter.

Google says this will allow Gemini to find a recipe someone sent you in Gmail, and then convert it into a shopping list in Google Keep, all with a simple voice request. You can also use it on many Android phones to ask for context about what’s on your screen.

If you have a smart home and want to control it, you can still revert to the old Google Assistant, but for now, Google has moved Gemini into its primary digital assistant slot and allowed it to tap into some basic Assistant controls. So, unlike at launch, you can now ask it to turn on/off smart lights and set times, but in my experience, you need to make sure your wording is specific, or it may not trigger the Assistant-based plugin, leaving you with an unfulfilled request.

At the end of its latest Gemini Press release, the company also shared that it focused on improving the AI’s accuracy and integrating it deeper into Google Home, the phone and messages apps on Android.

Source: Google