Table of Contents:
What do you need to get started with Google Home?
What kinds of things can I do with Google Home?
What types of devices work with Google Home?
There are hundreds of Google Home-enabled devices, with more coming on the market all the time:
- Smart plugs can allow users to control non-smart devices by providing or removing power. You can manage all of this through the Google Home app
- Google Home can control robot vacuums
- With smart Google Home-enabled doorbells or cameras, you can easily see who is at the door from anywhere in the house, the city, or the world — essentially, wherever you have a connection
- Smart thermostats and doorbells allow you to manually control your homes’ heating and cooling cycles — or to automate it entirely using geofencing so that when the house is empty, the heating dials back
- Window and door locks can be locked or unlocked remotely, and cameras can record exterior and interior movement
Getting alerts when a device joins your Google Home Group
You should always be alerted when another device joins your Google Home Group, especially if you’re the only person in your household. Your Google Home Group consists of all the Google and Chromecast devices set up in your home, and you’ll always want to be aware and in control of these devices and not get any surprises. This way, you’ll always know if someone is trying to hack into your Google account or add another device without your consent. Here’s how to get alerts for your Google Home Group:
- Open your Google Home app
- Go to Settings > General > Notifications
- Toggle on People and devices
Smart home devices like Google Nest can be extremely helpful for contacting loved ones in case of an emergency.
Setting up an Emergency Contact
- Open the Google Home app on your smartphone or tablet
- Tap the profile icon in the bottom right corner to access your account settings
- From the account settings menu, select Assistant settings
- Under the Assistant settings, scroll down and tap Emergency contacts
- Tap Add contact to add an emergency contact
- Once you’ve added the contact, you can assign a relationship label such as Spouse, Parent, or Sibling to help Google Home recognize the contact in case of an emergency
- Repeat the process to add additional emergency contacts if desired
Privacy settings
Your privacy settings are one of the most essential features of your Google Home device. It controls what devices are connected to it, private data, and even web activity. You should double-check to see which actions you have specifically authorized and switch off anything you don’t remember consenting to. Here’s how to update your Privacy Settings:
- Open the Google Home app
- Tap on your personal icon in the top right-hand corner
- Select You from the menu bar
- Tap Your Data in the Assistant to see what information you have listed
- Go to the Your data on the Assistant page.
- Under Your Assistant activity, tap My Activity
- To the right of the search bar at the top of the page, tap the icon of three stacked dots
- Tap Delete activity by
- If you want to start over with a clean slate, tap All time. Otherwise, you can choose to delete all data collected in the Last hour, Last day or create a Custom range, say, from the day you started using Google Home until last month
- The app will ask you to confirm that you want to delete your Google Assistant Activity for the specified period. Tap Delete to confirm
- You’ll see this message: “Deletion complete.” In the lower-right corner, tap Got it to return to the main Google Assistant Activity page
Changing your nickname
Creating a speaker group
Related:
- 5 Google Settings to update now to fix your privacy
- 6 smart home devices we love
- How to delete everything from your Google searches