Google Now

Use Google Now to Let Your Family Know When You Get Home

Google Now has more than one trick up its sleeve, and if you’re prepared to take a few minutes to set it up: You can have a card display whenever a family member arrives at home (or work). Here’s how to get the feature activated on your device. From the Google app menu tap Settings…

Google Now Is About to Get Even Better With Info From Other Apps

Android’s spectacular information hub Google Now is about to get even more useful thanks to new support for third-party apps. According to the WSJ, you’ll soon see cards in Google Now from Airbnb, Lyft, and “several dozen,” other apps. Google Now’s predictive information is just splendid. Using your search history and information from your email…

Identify Songs Without Shazam by Using Google Now

There are plenty of apps for identifying music while you’re listening to it, but you might not know that the same functionality is built into Google Now as well—it’s just one of the many features available inside Google’s digital assistant that aren’t immediately obvious to the casual user. If you hear a tune you would…

Report: Google Translate Is Getting Upgraded To Take on Skype

According to The New York Times, Google isn’t going to let Skype runaway with all the high-tech, language barrier-smashing fun. An upcoming update will allow the app to auto-recognize popular languages and translate them into text in real time. In addition, Google Translate will also let you take snapshots of signs or menus or whatever,…

Google News Will Now Pick Out News Stories It Thinks You Should Read

Google just added a new Suggested Stories feature to its news search results, so you can let the search engine pull up a customized selection of stories to read about based on whatever terrifyingly dense accumulation of personal data Google has on you by now. Krishna Bharat, who founded Google News, announced the new feature…

Siri vs. Google Now vs. Cortana: The Ultimate Voice Control Showdown

In the months since Windows Phone 8.1 showed up complete with its voice assistant, Android Lollipop and iOS 8 have arrived, so it’s time to pit our phone-friends against each other again. Voice control is better than ever. For the most part, as you can see, Cortana, Siri, and Google Now are mostly on even…

Google’s New Search App Has a New Look and App-Searching Superpowers

Over the last few weeks, Google has been adding Lollipop’s material design flourish to all of its big name apps and services, and now the Google app is finally getting the same treatment. But in addition to its new look, Google is pushing its voice assistant even harder by opening up “OK Google” search to…

Do You Actually Use Voice Control?

Yesterday, Amazon announced Echo, a Bluetooth speaker slash voice-controlled personal assistant, an omnipresent Siri that sits in your living room and answers whatever questions you might throw at it. So clearly, Amazon thinks that voice control is cool enough to warrant a standalone product. I’m just wondering who actually uses the damn thing. Despite having…

How To Disable Google Now on Your Android Device

Google Now is a glimpse of the future, a digital assistant that knows a surprising amount about you. It’s not for everyone though, and you might not want the app keeping tabs on everything you’re doing (and making suggestions accordingly). Here’s how to disable some or all of the Google Now service on your Android…

Google Now cards appear to have started warning us about impending solar eclipses. Which is, uh, useful?

This Short Film Explains Our Fascination With Talking to Computers

Using names like Siri, Cortana, and Google Now, advanced algorithms and technologies that would have baffled engineers and scientists half a century ago now rest in the palm of our hands. Talking with technology is the future of computing—mainly because that’s the way we’re built to communicate. Google’s short eight-minute documentary, Behind the Mic: The…

Google Now has a new card, which will keep an eye on flight prices for you. If you’ve been shopping on Google’s flight comparison siterecently, it would appear that you’ll get a Now card popping up with current flight prices for your intended destination on it. Now if only it could organise all your frequent-flyer…

6 Tips For Getting Started With Google Now

Are you still tracking your own packages, flights, and deliveries while tapping on your mobile device’s screen like a caveman? Not when we’re done, you won’t be. Here are seven simple steps you can take to turn Google Now into your personal digital secretary. Android users may already be well-familiar with Google Now’s powers, but…

50 Things Cortana Can Do Right Now (Compared To Siri and Google Now)

Cortana is Windows Phone’s answer to Siri and Google Now: A voice-activated artificially intelligent personal assistant with an only slightly off-putting robot voice. Technically, she’s still in beta on Windows 8.1, but PhoneBuff is here to show us 50 things Cortana can already do. Looks like Cortana’s got some seriously handy capabilities—and a pretty cheeky…

Set Reminders in Google Now Just By Searching Text on Your Laptop

Google Now reminders are great, but if you don’t feel like pulling out your phone and whispering part of your to-do list at it, there is now another way: Just hammer it into your search bar. As uncovered by Google Operating System, Google Now will take reminders through Google.com or through the omnibox in Chrome,…

Use Google Now’s Location Reminders To Power Through Your To Dos

One way to deal with tasks that you never get around to or are always forgetting is to attach a location to them. Google Now has had the ability to display reminders based on a place for a while now, and they only take a few seconds to set up. Launch the Google Search app…

If Google Now Mishears You, Correct It With “No, I Said…”

Google Now is great, but it’s not perfect. Sometimes it doesn’t hear you quite right. If that happens though, you don’t have to repeat the whole command; just tell Google the word it got wrong with “No, I said…” As 9to5Google explains, maybe you asked for “nearby bars” but Google inexplicably gave you results for…

Google Now Gets Voice Control for Music Playback

Some Android users are starting to see a cool new Google Now capability pop up: If you’ve got the update, you can use “OK Google” to fast forward to the next track or pause playback. Small update, but very handy. YouTuber MO Jams shows the feature in action above, and Android Police predicts that this…

Samsung Gear Live Review: That’s a Pretty Big Baby Step

Whether you believe that smartwatches are the inevitable future or that they’re the Devil’s own handcuffs, almost everyone can agree that they’ve been pretty weak so far. Android Wear is here to fix that. And it just might! Eventually. Samsung’s Gear Live is the first attempt, and while it’s got some issues, it’s a great…

“OK Google” Now Works From Anywhere On Your Android Phone

There’s a new update to the Google Search app that’s starting to roll out that lets you say “OK Google” to trigger voice search from anywhere instead of just the homescreen. That is awesome. We heard some rumors that Google would be trying to bring the yell-at-your-phone-from-anywhere superpowers the Moto X has to all phones,…