The smart speaker market has exploded in popularity over the last decade, with the Amazon Echo and Google Nest Audio emerging as two of the top choices for consumers looking to add a voice-controlled digital assistant to their home. While both of these smart speakers provide convenient hands-free access to music, information, and smart home controls, there are some notable differences to consider when deciding between the two. In this in-depth comparison, we‘ll take a closer look at the history, features, and strengths of the Amazon Echo and Google Nest Audio to help you determine which one is the best fit for your needs.
The Pioneering Amazon Echo
Amazon first introduced the Echo smart speaker in late 2014, making it one of the first mainstream devices of its kind. The initial tall, cylindrical Echo was equipped with far-field microphones, a speaker, and the new Alexa digital voice assistant. Users could ask Alexa to play music, set timers and alarms, add items to a shopping list, get weather and traffic info, and even control compatible smart home devices. The always-on, always-listening nature of the Echo made it simple to access a variety of functions and information without pulling out a smartphone.
Since the original Echo, Amazon has expanded its smart speaker lineup to include several different models. The Echo Dot is a compact, affordable option with a smaller speaker, ideal for those who want Alexa in more rooms of the house. The Echo Plus offers a slight upgrade in terms of speaker quality and smart home hub integration. For a more premium music listening experience, there‘s the Echo Studio with hi-fi audio including 3D audio and Dolby Atmos support. Amazon has also launched smart displays like the Echo Show 5, 8, 10, and 15 that combine the voice assistant capabilities of Alexa with a touchscreen for watching video content, looking at photos, making video calls, and more.
The Echo smart speakers support a wide range of music and audio content, with the ability to stream from Amazon Music, Apple Music, Spotify, Pandora, iHeartRadio, and others. You can also listen to audiobooks from Audible, radio stations, and podcasts. With multi-room audio, you can group multiple Echo speakers together for synchronized music playback throughout the home.
In addition to audio playback and voice controls, one of the Echo‘s biggest strengths is smart home integration. Alexa works with a huge assortment of third-party smart home brands like Philips Hue, Ring, August, Ecobee, and more. This allows you to use voice commands to control things like lights, thermostats, door locks, security cameras, robot vacuums and other connected devices. You can even create routines in the Alexa app to automate multiple smart home actions with a single voice command like "Alexa, goodnight", which could turn off the lights, lock the doors, and adjust the thermostat.
Amazon has continued to add new features and capabilities to Alexa over the years, so the Echo smart speakers keep getting better even after you buy them. And with an ever-expanding ecosystem of Alexa skills, voice apps, and compatible smart home products, there‘s no shortage of ways to put your Echo to use.
Google‘s Answer to Alexa
Not content to let Amazon dominate the emerging smart speaker market, Google launched its first competitor in late 2016 with the original Google Home. Powered by the Google Assistant voice AI, the air freshener-shaped Google Home boasted a lot of the same capabilities as the Amazon Echo, including on-demand music, hands-free information lookup, and smart home voice control.
Like the Echo lineup, the Google Home family has grown over time with the addition of new models at varying price points and designs. The donut-sized Google Home Mini put Google Assistant in a more affordable and compact form factor, while the Home Max targeted audiophiles with hi-fi sound in a much larger speaker cabinet.
In 2019, Google moved its smart speaker products under the Nest brand umbrella, resulting in names like Nest Mini and Nest Hub (a smart display akin to the Echo Show). The flagship speaker itself got an update and rebrand in 2020 with the release of the $99 Nest Audio, a vertically-oriented rectangular speaker available in Chalk, Charcoal, Sage, Sand and Sky color options.
As a voice assistant, the Google Assistant draws on the company‘s deep experience in web search and natural language processing. Reviewers have found the Google Assistant adept at understanding voice commands and providing relevant, accurate information in response to all sorts of queries leveraging Google‘s Knowledge Graph. The Nest Audio has a feature called Ambient IQ that lets the speaker automatically adjust the audio to suit the background noise in the room. And like the Echo, you can create speaker groups for multi-room audio or stereo pair two speakers for left and right channel separation.
The Nest Audio supports major music services like YouTube Music, Spotify, Pandora, and Deezer, with additional content available via podcast support and built-in Chromecast for audio. On the smart home front, Google Assistant is compatible with a wide variety of brands and products (albeit not quite as many as Alexa), allowing for voice control of lights, plugs, thermostats, vacuums, locks, and more. There‘s also support for routines to trigger multiple actions with a single voice command, similar to Alexa.
Head to Head: Echo vs Nest Audio
Looking at the current flagship models from each company, the Amazon Echo (4th Gen) and Google Nest Audio are comparably priced at $99 each, although both often go on sale for less. They take a strikingly different approach to design, with the spherical Echo having a futuristic orb-like aesthetic while the Nest Audio opts for a softer, more home-friendly rounded rectangle shape that isn‘t too obtrusive.
In terms of audio quality, both speakers sound quite good for their size and price, with solid clarity, decent bass, and room-filling volume. The 4th-gen Echo gets a bit louder and produces slightly stronger bass than the Nest Audio, but both are more than adequate for casual music listening, podcasts, and voice assistant interactions. If you‘re a discerning audiophile, you‘ll likely want to step up to the Echo Studio or add-on a higher-end speaker via Bluetooth or a 3.5mm audio jack.
Alexa has the edge in terms of smart home integration, with support for more third-party platforms and devices than Google Assistant. However, the Google Assistant is generally better at natural language processing and providing informative responses to questions and commands. Both voice assistants are quite capable overall and continue to improve over time with frequent updates and new features.
Another area where Amazon has an advantage is in the sheer breadth of the Echo/Alexa ecosystem, which includes everything from smart speakers and displays to earbuds, rings, eyeglasses, wall clocks, and even microwaves and dog treats. Google doesn‘t offer quite the same range or diversity in its Assistant-powered devices, although the Nest lineup does include smart thermostats, security cameras, doorbells, smoke alarms, and Wi-Fi routers in addition to speakers and displays.
The Ongoing Rivalry
Over the years, the intense competition between Amazon and Google in the smart speaker space has resulted in rapid innovation and improvements on both sides. Since the two companies released their first smart speakers, we‘ve seen the rapid development of more natural-sounding voice synthesis, support for a wider range of languages and accents, better understanding of conversational context, more proactive/predictive features, and tighter integration with a growing number of smart home devices.
With each new generation and software update, Alexa and Google Assistant have become more helpful, more knowledgeable, and easier to converse with. Amazon and Google continue to open up new developer tools and monetization opportunities to attract more third-party integrations and voice apps to their platforms. And as smart home adoption rises, both companies keep working to position their voice assistants as the central hub for controlling all the various connected products around the house.
Amazon and Google aren‘t the only big tech firms vying for smart speaker/voice assistant supremacy, of course. Apple offers the premium HomePod mini speaker powered by Siri, while Samsung has the Galaxy Home mini with Bixby built-in. There are also third-party speakers like the Sonos One that support both Alexa and Google Assistant. However, Amazon and Google remain the two dominant players and are likely to keep pushing each other to new heights for the foreseeable future.
The Bottom Line
For most people, the choice between Amazon Echo and Google Nest Audio will come down to three main factors:
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Compatibility with your existing devices and services. If you‘re already invested in Amazon‘s ecosystem with Prime, Fire TV, Ring, Eero Wi-Fi, etc., the Echo will probably make more sense. Those who use a lot of Google products and services like Gmail, Google Calendar, Chromecast, and Nest smart home devices will likely find the Nest Audio a more natural fit.
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Your priorities in a voice assistant. If you‘ll primarily use your smart speaker for music playback and smart home control, Alexa and the Echo have a slight leg up thanks to a wider selection of supported audio services and smart home integrations. If you value the ability to ask complex questions and get authoritative, in-depth answers, you may prefer Google Assistant powered by Google‘s search capabilities.
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Your design preference. The spherical 4th-gen Echo and tall rounded rectangle Nest Audio have very different industrial design aesthetics. The one you find most attractive and suitable for your home decor is certainly a valid factor to consider.
Ultimately, both of these smart speakers offer very similar core features and capabilities, so there‘s not really a bad choice between the two. If you want the best of both worlds, you could even get an Echo for one room and a Nest Audio for another to compare the experience and maintain flexibility.
With either option, you‘ll gain the convenience and power of an AI-driven voice-controlled digital assistant that can help you stay informed, entertained, and connected. As the underlying natural language processing technology continues to advance, interacting with Alexa and Google Assistant via smart speakers like the Echo and Nest Audio is becoming an increasingly seamless and integral part of daily life for millions of people.
