Google and Apple go head to head in yet another field... Mike compares Google Home and Apple HomePod
They already compete in so many areas—operating systems, phones, and online services—but now Google and Apple are adding a new area of competition to the mix: smart speakers.
Here, Google has a massive head start on Apple, with its Google Home speaker released in November 2016. Apple’s new smart speaker, the HomePod, won’t be released until December 2017, giving the search giant more than a year’s head start.
But while Google Home has the advantage of time, Apple has clearly designed its upcoming HomePod, first previewed at WWDC 2017, to compete.
However, you simply cannot talk about smart speakers without mentioning The King: Amazon’s Echo and Echo Dot.
Amazon’s been operating in this space for the best part of two years now and it has learnt a lot in the process. The net result of this is that Alexa, Amazon’s AI, is smarter and can do more than Siri and Google Assistant combined.
In time, that gap with shrink but for now Amazon’s Echo is very much out on the cutting edge. And compared to Apple’s HomePod, it is exceptionally cheap!
The big area where Apple is lagging behind Google and Amazon is with the actual usability of its personal assistant, Siri.
For the most part, Siri, though more senior than both Google’s and Amazon’s solutions, is pretty useless at present in comparison.
All this will change with the release of iOS 11 though, as Apple has been working hard on Siri behind the scenes for the past 12 months. And the reason for this is that Siri will be the thing that powers its HomePod devices but also because voice is where things are going.
“Siri is also getting a new Translation feature in beta, for translating from English to Chinese, French, German, Italian, and Spanish, with more language combinations coming soon,” reports The Verge.
“Siri will also use "on-device learning" to be more predictive about what you want next, based on your existing use of the digital assistant. That learning gets synced across all your devices, but remains private to you, according to Apple.”
Siri will also be open to third party developers as well, meaning they can use it to integrate with their applications. This opens up a myriad of possibilities for Siri in the immediate future, as Apple has a HUGE amount of developer support. Much more than Amazon and Google.
A short time ahead of the official release date of the Apple HomePod, Apple chief Tim cook has gone on record with a few comments regarding what consumers can expect from the device, as well as how he thinks it will compete with Amazon and Google's well-established alternatives.
Speaking to The Financial Post, Cook indicated that unlike Google and Amazon, Apple has no plans to put its voice assistant AI inside third party devices.
"Competition makes all of us better and I welcome it, (but) if you are both trying to license something and compete with your licensees, this is a difficult model and it remains to be seen if it can be successful or not."
In other words, Apple is going to focus on creating its own fusion of hardware, software, and services, and deliver them to customers directly.
For the HomePod itself, Cook believes the hardware aspects will make it stand out against rivals.
"We think one thing that was missing from the market was a quality audio experience, a very immersive audio experience. Music deserves that kind of quality as opposed to some kind of squeaky sound."
The HomePod will retail from $349, putting it close to its main rival, the Google Home Max ($399), which is also an effort to introduce high quality audio to the smart speaker space.
But just how does Apple’s HomePod compare with Google Home? We took a look at both smart speakers to find out.
Google Home vs. Apple HomePod: Design
Both smart speakers are squat and relatively round in shape. At 172mm tall x 142 mm in diameter, the HomePod comes in both taller and larger than Home’s 142.8 mm x 96.4 mm body.
Another defining design difference is Google’s Home has a polycarbonate body while the HomePod is covered in a mesh material. Both smart speakers also feature a touch-capacitive top which allows you to interact with the device.
The HomePod is definitely the better looking of the two devices. It’s far prettier, has better audio capabilities, and will likely look better on your mantlepiece versus Google’s Home which is a little naff looking.
Apple’s pushed hard on the audio front with HomePod. It knows Siri is a bit rubbish when compared to Google Assistant and Alexa, so it is looking to make up ground where it really counts in this context: audio performance.
Essentially, Apple wants to beat the Sonos Play One in this regard while seemingly dispatching Google Home and Amazon Echo as your home’s default smart speaker. And early reviews suggest Apple might have just pulled it off.
And not that it matters too much because you won’t be moving them around a lot, but the Home is literally 1/5th the weight of the HomePod, at 1.05lbs versus the HomePod’s 5.5lbs. While the HomePod comes in white or black models, the Home always features a white top, while its lower half can be customized in one of seven different colors.
Apple’s apparently kept one major feature of HomePod under wraps, though, no one’s really sure why? According to a developer, who dug inside the code for HomePod’s software, there is evidence that the device will feature an LED display on the front.
“Steven Troughton-Smith,” reports BGR, “shared his discovery of what appears to be the control framework for an LED matrix display in the HomePod OS. While digging into the functionality of the built-in “+” and “-” controls on the HomePod itself, Troughton-Smith’s discovery points to an LED grid of sorts, complete with RGB capability which could potentially be used as a rudimentary display of sorts.”
This display will NOT be like an iPhone display; rather, it will use a series of light-up dots to display basic information and notifications. This visual element was not mentioned at launch, like, at all, so the big question now is why did Apple keep it a secret?
One answer could be that it the feature wasn’t ready for launch, the other, which I’m leaning more towards, is that Apple will use this previously unknown feature in adverts to drum up hype around the HomePod’s release inside Q4.
Either way, it’s quite a nifty little feature.
And not that it matters too much because you won’t be moving them around a lot, but the Home is literally 1/5th the weight of the HomePod, at 1.05lbs versus the HomePod’s 5.5lbs. While the HomePod comes in white or black models, the Home always features a white top, while its lower half can be customized in one of seven different colors.
Google Home vs. Apple HomePod: Conversational Commands
The way you primarily interact with both smart speakers is by voice. For the HomePod you are interacting with Apple’s Siri. On the Home you are interacting with Google Assistant, which is basically a voice given to Google’s powerful search engine. The fact that Home doesn’t have an assistant with a human name is a bit of a turnoff. Why? When you’re speaking in your home it’s nice to think you are talking
The fact that Home doesn’t have an assistant with a human name is a bit of a turnoff. Why? When you’re speaking in your home it’s nice to think you are talking to something like you instead of a cold computer mainframe. Apple’s Siri name is more beneficial because you activate it by saying “Hey, Siri” and then speaking your command. For the Home, you say “OK, Google.”
Naming conventions aside, Home’s AI seems to beat Apple’s Siri because it’s got the power of Google’s search engine and machine learning behind it. Home has the ability to carry out tasks based on conversations, not just commands. For example, you could say:
“How many States are there in America?”
“Which one is closest?”
“Show me a map on TV.”
These are three different queries that rely on each other. Google Home can follow your line of questioning and though. HomePod, as far as we can tell, can’t. Currently, Siri’s commands are limited to doing one thing at a time. It can’t connect the dots of conversations. However, that could change by the time HomePod ships as it will use the newly refined version of Siri shipping with iOS 11.
Google Home vs. Apple HomePod: Media Abilities
Another area where Home wins is in its media capabilities. Like the Echo before it, Home can stream from a number of music services including Google Play Music, Spotify, Pandora, iHeartRadio, TuneIn, and others.
However, at the time of this writing HomePod only supports Apple Music. Both speakers also have the ability to stream music to play multi-room audio. That’s because the HomePod can stream music to multiple rooms thanks to AirPlay 2 and Home can work with Chromecast to do the same to non-Home speakers.
Google Home vs. Apple HomePod: Personal Assistant Tasks
Right now, it seems both Home and HomePod are about tied in the tests front. Both HomePod and HomePod can do tasks such as adding items to a calendar, setting a timer, reading you the news, making a shopping list, making a to-do list, checking flight statuses, and tracking a package.
It’s unclear whether Apple will allow HomePod to support third-party apps (which would be similar to the “Skills” found on Echo) or not by the time it ships. If it does, the HomePod could become more useful than Home.
Google Home vs. Apple HomePod: Third Party Smart Home Device Integration
Here, both also seem tied. Both can support third party smart home devices from Philips Hue, Nest, Samsung SmartThings and Wemo. But by the time HomePod ships it’s likely it will support devices from those and much more smart home manufacturers via its HomeKit platform.
Google Home vs. Apple HomePod: Price & Verdict
It’s really too early to call which is better considering HomePod doesn’t ship until November. But as is the case, if you’re already tied into Apple’s ecosystem, HomePod is probably the better choice for you thanks to its integration with Apple’s services.
If you’re tied to Google's Android ecosystem, then the Home is probably a better choice—not to mention it’s already out. Right now Home is sold in the UK for £129, while the HomePod doesn’t have UK pricing yet, but will retail in the US for a hefty $349 (about £270).
Personally, I'd get Amazon Echo over both of them.
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