7 reasons Google’s Assistant stomps Siri
Google's new flagship Pixel and Pixel XL (read Mashable's review here) arrive on Thursday. They're pretty great phones if you can look past the snoozy designs and premium pricing.
They're also the first and only phones with the Google Assistant, an intelligent digital assistant that's constantly learning about you and tries to anticipate your needs.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai calls the Assistant "your own personal Google" and it's clear the company plans to make it the center all its devices. It's basically Siri on steroids. And though it's still very new and limited in what it can do, because it has access to infinite information from Google Search, it's already smarter than Siri or Cortana by a mile.
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1. Better English comprehension
There's nothing more frustrating than having to repeat yourself to a digital assistant because it didn't understand you the first time. Or you paused to think, or changed your mind mid-sentence, and the assistant just left you hanging.
Google Assistant really understands conversational English. It almost never fails to understand what I'm saying and can correct itself even when I pause mid-sentence and change my query.
Siri, despite how much better it is today compared to 2011, still has a hard time recognizing the words I tell it. It's especially worse if you have a strong accent. Google Assistant rarely ever has issues with English accents.
The only caveat to Google Assistant is that it only understands English and Hindi. More languages will no doubt be added in the future, but it sucks if you speak Chinese or Spanish, the first and second most-spoken languages in the world.
(Note: I only tried the Assistant in English as I don't speak Hindi.)
2. Better answers
You can't beat the best search engine in town. (Sorry, Bing!) Using Google Assistant is essentially the same as typing in the Google search bar, except you just speak your search. Google Assistant knows 70 billion facts and it's constantly learning more.
Google Assistant was able to answer a simple trivia question like "How old is the Taj Mahal" but Siri just showed me its location map from Foursquare. That's not what I asked for, Siri.
3. Universal translator
Google Translate is really great, but typing out what you want translated is a pain. Same is opening an app.
With Google Assistant, you can just say "Translate ______ in [insert language]" and you'll get instant results read right back to you.
It's basically like having Star Trek's universal translator.
Siri can't translate any language.
4. Easily find videos on YouTube
It should come as no surprise the Google Assistant can find videos on YouTube better than Siri can. Google owns YouTube, after all.
Ask the Assistant to "show the Pen Pineapple Apple Song" or "Show the Nyan Cat Song" or "Show me the new Rogue One trailer" and it'll find the exact one on YouTube.
Siri misheard "Nyan" for "Yan" and "Indiana cat" before it got it right. For what it's worth, even though it thought I said "Yan cat" it still showed a bunch of Nyan Cat vids from Bing. Siri also opens iTunes when you ask for a song like PPAP.
5. Find upcoming events
Finding fun things to do is a chore. Nobody wants to spend time doing "research". That's why it was so great to see the Google Assistant help find things for me.
Based on my location and time, it was able to show me a list of upcoming concerts and museum art exhibitions.
Siri just searched Bing for some articles that I'd have to comb through. Ugh.
6. Takes selfies on command
Here's the situation: You spot Kim Kardashian and only have a second to take a selfie. Which digital assistant can you count on to snap a fast one? Google Assistant or Siri?
I have to go with Google Assistant. If I ask it to take a selfie, it launches the camera app and starts a 3-second timer and then snaps a selfie.
Ask Siri and it just launches the camera app and switches to the front-facing camera, but it doesn't take the photo.
Sorry Siri, but Google wins again.
7. Searches apps
Google Assistant has all the capabilities of Google Now on Tap, which means it's capable of searching the screen for related information and serving up images, links, videos and more.
Siri, sadly, has no such contextual brainpower.
Raymond Wong is Mashable's Senior Tech Correspondent. He reviews gadgets and tech toys and analyzes the tech industry. Raymond's also a bit of a camera geek, gamer, and fine chocolate lover. Before arriving at Mashable, he was the Deputy Editor of NBC Universal's tech publication DVICE. His writing has appeared on G4TV, BGR, Yahoo and Ubergizmo, to name a few. You can follow Raymond on Twitter @raywongy or Instagram @sourlemons.
