Best Nest and Google Assistant Devices
Smart home devices can provide added functionality and convenience in many parts of your home. With a simple voice command, the Google Assistant can adjust your thermostat, turn off your lights, lock your door, check the weather, and more. When the assistant launched in 2016, it was only compatible with four smart home brands — today that number is number is more than 10,000. That gives you plenty of devices to choose from, but it also makes it hard to narrow down your options. That’s why we’ve done the work for you.
If you’re ready to jump into a Google-powered smart home, we’ve rounded up the best Google Nest devices and Google Assistant-compatible smart home products. Start with a smart display or smart speaker, then move on to our picks for compatible LED light bulbs, door locks, smart switches, smart thermostats, and other handy gadgets. There’s something for every smart home lover on our list, so check out our top picks below to find your new favorite smart gadget.
read more: The exact cost of setting up a Google Assistant Smart Home
The Google Nest Hub (formerly the Home Hub) is a great way to start a Google-centric smart home. It uses Google Assistant to respond to the same voice commands as a Google Home smart speaker. The touchscreen shows you extra information when you ask about the weather, search for restaurants, and so on. Plus, you can use this smart home hub to watch videos or scroll through family photos.
Unique adaptive brightness sensors make the Nest Hub a great digital photo frame, as it adjusts to both light levels and color temperature so it always looks like a physical photo in a frame. You can set it to play a scrolling slideshow of family photos as your screensaver. Google’s Soli is also on board this second-gen model for sleep sensing and Quick Gestures, like pausing media with an air tap in front of the screen.
The Nest Hub is also a great kitchen assistant, as it walks you through recipes step by step and lets you multitask while you cook. Set a timer, play music, add an ingredient to your shopping list — the Nest Hub will even remember your place in the recipe the next time you need to check it. You can connect it to your Wi-Fi network and set it up with the Google Home app, and you can ask the Google Nest Hub all the questions you would the original Google Home.
All of these voice control features make the Nest Hub useful in so many ways, but a simple Control Center makes it the best choice for your central connected home device. Swipe down from the top for shortcuts that let you turn off the lights or check your smart home security cameras, then tap to see a room-by-room (living room, kitchen, etc.) view of all your devices. Control Center is clean and useful, especially if you have family members who have trouble remembering how to phrase voice commands. Now they can just tap.
The Nest Hub is our favorite smart display, and it’s reasonably priced at $100. It’s useful even if you don’t have a lot of smart home gadgets, but it’s a must-have if you want a smart home that works with Google Assistant.
If having an extra screen in your home would be a nuisance, the Google Nest Mini is a great starting point for a smart home. Now in its second generation, Google’s diminutive smart speaker offers the same Google Assistant-driven voice commands as the rest, plus handy extras like intercom functionality and stereo pairing with multiple Minis. Control compatible gadgets, search the web, play music and more just by asking. The audio quality on the Nest Mini is surprisingly good, especially in this second-generation model.
The Nest Mini is also cute, and comes in four colors (though Coral is currently out of stock). At $49, it’s the least expensive way to try out smart home features without sacrificing voice control. The Nest Mini also makes a great secondary device. If you put a Google Nest Hub in your kitchen, you can put a Nest Mini in another room and both devices can control any compatible smart devices you set up. Even if they can both hear you, only the one closest to you will respond.
Changing your thermostat temperature with a voice command is a cool trick that never really gets old. Many smart thermostats work with Google Assistant. Check out our list of the best smart thermostats for options. Since Google owns Nest, the third-generation Nest Learning Thermostat is the obvious choice here, but I prefer the Ecobee3 Lite.
Ecobee’s budget model and accompanying app (for iOS and Android) offer most of the same smarts as pricier competing models, including the $250 Nest thermostat. It responds to all the same voice commands, and its intuitive controls make manual scheduling a breeze.
The Wyze Cam is easy to recommend. It’s affordable, works well, cloud storage is free for 14 days — and you have the option to use a microSD card for local storage if you want.
In a side-by-side comparison between the previous-generation Wyze Cam and the recent model, we could see a noticeable improvement in performance. Not only does it have a wider field of view, but the new camera also has a brighter, sharper live feed, helping it perform in both low-light and normal daylight conditions.
If you pay for the new Cam Plus subscription service, you’ll get access to person alerts and longer-live video clips, starting at $2 a month. Sure, there are more advanced cameras out there, but Wyze continues to impress us with its high-quality, budget-friendly smart home products, and this sub-$40 Wyze Cam is no exception.
The Arlo Pro 4 is an excellent outdoor security camera with solid performance and versatility. With a strong feature set, reliable design, and a competitive subscription service, the Pro 4 is our favorite outdoor camera of 2024. At $200, it’s not the most affordable device on the market, but you can find it for much less online.
The Pro 4 is both luxurious and practical. Some of its best features include 2K resolution, a 160-degree field of view, full-color night vision (though it switches to monochrome in really low light), two-way talk, a built-in siren, and a motion-sensitive floodlight — the whole lot. It’s easy to set up and use, and unlike the Arlo Pro 3, the Pro 4 connects directly to your Wi-Fi. The only downside is a lack of features without a subscription, but at $3 a month it’s reasonable and in line with competitors.
SimpliSafe’s wide range of accessories rivals professional options from companies like ADT. The starter kit is a reasonable $245 (and sometimes cheaper during sales). Unfortunately, you have to pay for remote app access, but $28 a month gets you that and professional monitoring.
The $28 monthly subscription also lets you control your system with Google Assistant, making SimpliSafe devices respond quickly to your voice commands.
Nest has another option here that offers a viable alternative. The Nest Guard costs more up front, but you can do a lot more without a subscription. But with all the reliable accessories, SimpliSafe’s kit beats the Nest Guard, especially if you want surveillance.
Speaking of locking your home, the easy-to-install August Wi-Fi Smart Lock fits over your existing deadbolt. Built-in Wi-Fi lets you control it remotely and with voice recognition, so you can tell Google Assistant to lock your door.
The August Wi-Fi Smart Lock has a lot of features, including open-close sensors, so you can check to see if you’ve closed the door when you leave. August is also responsive and reliable, making the Wi-Fi Smart Lock a great choice if you want to put Google Assistant in charge of your smart lock, door, and entryway.
Rounding this out with another one from Nest, the Nest Doorbell is a top-notch wireless device with excellent specs and unique benefits. While its predecessor Nest Hello (now called Nest Doorbell (Wired)) is still available for purchase, the battery-powered option has a more impressive design and better performance, making it an upgrade on almost every level.
The Nest Doorbell with Battery is an affordable $180 and offers a bunch of nice features: two-way talk, high-def resolution, a 145-degree field of view with a 3:4 aspect ratio, smart notifications, facial recognition, and a few other nice extras. Best of all, many of these best features are available right out of the box — no monthly Nest Aware subscription required.
While there are a few video doorbells I like better (namely the Arlo Wire-Free ), the Nest Doorbell (Battery) is a solid device. If you’re a Google loyalist or looking for a wire-free device with smart features without the monthly fees, this video doorbell might be the one for you.
Once you’ve set up control points with a smart display or smart speaker, it’s time to think about what smart devices you want. A smart light bulb is a good first step, and the Wyze Bulb White works particularly well with Google.
We’ve found these affordable Wi-Fi smart bulbs to be more reliable than Bluetooth rivals like the C by GE. At $17 for a pair, just screw them in, power them on, pair them with the Wyze mobile app, and enjoy the glow of dirt-cheap smart light.
A smart plug is a great way to add connectivity to dumb devices. Plug in a lamp or fan and you can control it with an app. The TP-Link Kasa Smart Plug offers smartphone app control and is compatible with Google Assistant. Plus, it has an attractive design that won’t block neighboring outlets.
It won’t monitor energy, but the smart plug will let you control an old-fashioned standing fan with your voice for a reasonable price. Like most smart plugs, it works with a 2.4GHz Wi-Fi network connection.
