Google Home Speaker review: was the first-ever smart speaker with Gemini worth the wait?

After years of waiting, the Google Home Speaker finally launched in June 2026 – but was it worth the wait?

Google’s long awaited smart speaker is a serious advancement on its previous Nest speaker and display devices. Not only has it undergone a full design transformation, but the Google Home Speaker comes with Gemini instead of Google Assistant, offering a more natural and conversational way to interact with your speaker

But aside from its made-over looks and new voice assistant, how does the Google Home Speaker measure up? I spent a few weeks using it to find out.

Google Home Speaker review: price and availability

The Google Home Speaker is available to buy for £99.99 / $99.99 at Google Store and select retailers, like Currys, Argos and John Lewis. Alternatively, you can buy the Google Home Speaker in instalments for £33.33 with three monthly instalments.

The Google Home Speaker comes in two colours – hazel or porcelain. At launch, it was announced that it would come in more colours which could arrive later in the year.

To use the Google Home Speaker, it’s recommended to have a Google Home Premium subscription. When you install the speaker in the app, you should be offered a six month free trial before there’s a monthly cost of £8 / $10 or annual fee of £80 / $100 for the standard plan. The advanced plan is £16 / $20 a month or £160 / $200 a year.

Google Home Speaker review: set up and app

The Google Home Speaker arrived with just the speaker and a charging cable – nice and simple. Once I’d plugged it into my room of choice, I downloaded the Google Home app and scanned the barcode on the bottom of the speaker. From there, I connected to my Wi-Fi so I could add the Google Home Speaker to my list of devices.

The Google Home app is straightforward and has three sections – home, activity and automations. The homepage has all your devices listed so you can access them quickly, while activity shows everything you’ve asked the Google Home Speaker to do. Finally, automations is where you can set up schedules.

Once I had the Google Home Speaker on my app, I connected it to other devices like my Philips Hue light bulb and Spotify account, and set up an evening wind down routine and a few reminders. I also had to select a voice for Gemini which had a surprising amount of options available.

Google Home Speaker review: design and features

The Google Home Speaker is the first smart speaker to be built on Gemini for Home. While you still have to say ‘Hey Google’ like you did with Google’s previous speakers, Gemini is much more conversational and can continue chats if you have any follow-up questions. You can also interrupt it if you need to adjust things without having to constantly say ‘Hey Google’ to get its attention.

In terms of design, the Google Home Speaker is quite different from Google’s Nest devices, like the Nest Mini and Nest Audio. In fact, it looks more like an Amazon Echo Dot. It has a round 360-degree design with a flat top and base and it has a fabric-like material.

When you speak to Gemini, the base of the Google Home Speaker lights up in different colours via its light ring. It has a microphone built-in which you can mute via the toggle switch at the back. It’s quite petite, although it has an extra-long cable and plug so you can position it easily.

As a speaker, the Google Home Speaker has 360-degree sound for powerful, balanced audio from every direction. It can also be used to ask questions, play music, create invites and reminders, set timers, trigger automations and detect unusual events and send you notifications. However, a lot of these features require a Google Home Premium subscription.

If you’re an existing Nest user, the Google Home Speaker is compatible with older Nest speakers, displays and Google Cast-enabled devices.

Google Home Speaker review: performance

I’ve tested a few smart speakers in my time as T3’s Home Editor, and the Google Home Speaker has my favourite looks by far. Its rounded shape takes up minimal space, and its light bar emits pretty colours. The Google Home Speaker also has built-in sensors which are extremely responsive as the light bar would eliminate if I or anyone else would approach it.

Audio is where I found the Google Home Speaker to excel the most. Its sound is powerful, and Gemini is crisp and clear. Compared to other voice assistants I’ve tried, Gemini is nice and conversational, and it’s very handy to simply ask follow-up questions rather than having to say the wake up word over and over again.

But Gemini is also where I found the Google Home Speaker to have faults. Many users have experienced problems with Gemini, like minute-long lags and even just ignoring requests. Sadly, I am one of those users. While Gemini did respond smoothly most of the time, I did find it to have some serious delays.

I also experienced an issue with Gemini setting timers. Most of the time, my timers and reminders went off perfectly. But recently, I set a timer for 20 minutes and I’d checked the time before I requested the timer so I knew it’d hit the time limit. I wasn’t notified and when I asked how long was left on the timer, it said 12 minutes, so I’m not sure what time Gemini actually set the timer for – not ideal when you’re cooking, let me tell you.

The initial set up process was easy and I liked the usability of the app. It responded quickly and was extremely self-explanatory, and when I wasn’t sure how to do something, I was always given an explanation or taken to a support page. At times, though, I found that the app didn’t always correspond to the speaker, so while I set a reminder in the app, the Google Home Speaker didn’t notify me when I’d requested.

Google Home Speaker review: verdict

Is the Google Home Speaker a good smart speaker? My answer is both yes and no. For the former, I can’t deny how attractive the Google Home Speaker is, and I appreciate its sensors and audio. However, the ‘no’ part of my answer is all down to Gemini.

I think the Google Home Speaker maybe needed a few more months of work before it was released. I found Gemini to be very conversational, easy to talk to and most of the time, extremely helpful. However, I also experienced a few bugs and faults that were hard to overlook.

Personally, I’d use the Google Home Speaker for listening to music and setting the occasional timer – just not when I’m cooking – but for automations, I’d look for a different brand.

Google Home Speaker review: alternatives to consider

Since the Google Home Speaker’s launch, the Google Nest Mini and Audio have been discontinued so you won’t be able to buy one of these anymore. However, if you have an existing one, I’d recommend holding on to them as you can still use them, and Google has stated it’ll still undergo necessary updates on them.

I’m a fan of Amazon Echo devices, and the Echo Dot is hard to beat. The Echo Dot Max is its latest launch and I rated it highly in my review. It's got the looks, has both manual and voice controls, and it’s a great device to have as part of your smart home ecosystem.