At the IFA tech show in Berlin, Google announced that the Google Assistant is now bilingual, making it the first voice assistant to be able to seamlessly switch between two different languages.
Starting today, Google Assistant’s new bilingual support should make it more useful in homes where family members speak two languages—meaning you can now speak to the Google Assistant (on phones and smart speakers) in any two of the following languages: English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, or Japanese (more will be supported in the coming months).
Users will have to select which two languages they want their Google Assistant to understand. For example, if your family speaks English and German, you can ask the Google Assistant questions in either of those two languages interchangeably.
Also, For user who have Google Home and a Chromecast linked to your TV, you’ll now be able to see more visual results on the big screen. The Assistant now displays things like the weather, sports scores, stocks, and other personalised content you might want to see. And if you’re already watching content with Chromecast, Google says the Assistant’s visual results will overlay on top of it instead of kicking you over to a new screen.
There’s also an improvement on the voice-casting support for Chromecast. For example, instead of having to say a long command like “Hey Google, play Stranger Things on Living Room TV,” you can just say “Hey Google, play Stranger Things” if you’ve already set your Chromecast to default to a specific TV.
To add support for two languages, go to the Settings menu in the Google Assistant app, choose Preferences, then choose Assistant Languages. Once enabled, users can switch freely between their two languages of choice, according to a Google AI blog post explaining the process to make it bilingual
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