What you need to know
- Google is informing headphone users with Assistant support that the AI helper will lose its "touch-and-hold" function for notifications and the ability to reply.
- A post states users will soon have to say "Hey Google" aloud in order for the AI to read your notifications.
- Google made a similar move for earbuds in September, which prompted users on Reddit to voice their displeasure.
Google is continuing to alter the Assistant within its ever-changing ecosystem, and this latest move impacts audio devices.
In a community post, the company drew attention to an upcoming change that will affect how users interact with the Google Assistant on headphones (via Android Police). Google states the Assistant will soon lose the ability to read your notifications aloud when "pressed to activate."
In addition to this, the post states users will no longer be able to leverage the Assistant to reply to notifications, either.
A follow-up support document expands on this, stating users will now have to manage the Assistant vocally. Instead of pressing a button, the Assistant will only respond to "Hey Google, read my notifications" moving forward.
Curiously, Google states it "will be" making this change to all headphones with Assistant as its virtual helper. However, the post fails to explicitly state when users can see this change go into effect. It'll be worth keeping an eye on things as we enter the final week of February.
It seems like we should brace for a future where we lose this ability on two of the best headphones with the Assistant: the Bose QuietComfort Ultra and Sony's WH-1000XM5. We could say we're surprised by this development, but we saw the same thing happen to earbuds with Google Assistant support in September. Things happened in reverse order as users took to Reddit to report the sudden jarring change to the Pixel Buds Pro.
Users were hit with a message stating, "touch and hold won't read notifications anymore." Similarly, they were told to say "Hey Google" aloud for those functions. It didn't sit well with users as they stated the touch-and-hold method was more private and convenient — but most of all silent.
Android Central reached out to Google at the time and the company stated it made the change "based on user feedback." It also confirmed that the change would stick, forcing users to have to speak aloud to the AI. The company reiterated a similar tune with its headphone announcement, meaning those users will lose out on the private touch-and-hold method.
It's also worth mentioning that the Pixel Buds Pro 2 debuted in August with deep integration with Gemini, instead of the Assistant.
