24-07-2025
I ditched Google Home years ago, so why are you still using it in 2025?
Lil Katz / Android Authority
🗣️ This is an open thread.
We want to hear from you! Share your thoughts in the comments and vote in the poll below — your take might be featured in a future roundup.
It wasn't that long ago that Google Home seemed like the smart home platform to be invested in. Google Assistant had numerous advantages over Amazon Alexa, Google's smart home hardware was among the best on the market, and unique third-party options from Lenovo and JBL kept things interesting.
But fast forward to 2025, and Google Home is a shell of its former self. Google killed third-party smart speakers/displays, the company's own hardware ambitions have all but stalled out, and the Google Home app is — to put it nicely — a mess.
This recently came to light in a Reddit thread on r/GoogleHome, where current Google Home users expressed their mounting frustration with the platform. Complaints range from Google's smart speakers being unable to understand people's commands to slow/delayed responses, as well as routines not working as expected.
As a former Google Home user myself, I can, unfortunately, sympathize with all of this. Google Home was the smart home platform I used for my first couple of apartments, and between 2016 and about 2019, things were great.
The original Google Home speaker and Google Home Hub remain some of my favorite pieces of smart home hardware. The wood-backed Lenovo Smart Display was a staple in my kitchen, and Google Assistant, along with the Google Home app, were as reliable as I could ask for.
But at some point, things began to take a noticeable turn for the worse. My speakers started failing to hear my 'OK Google' commands and would often misinterpret what I said to them. Asking Google Assistant to turn a smart light on/off often resulted in an error message, the Assistant forgot room names I had set up, etc. There wasn't a single day or instance where everything broke, but over time, things deteriorated to the point where I decided to replace all my Google Home speakers and displays with Amazon Alexa ones.
Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
While I reached my breaking point with Google Home, it's apparent that many people are still suffering through it, and that makes me curious — why?
If you're still using Google Home in 2025, I'd love to know why you've stuck with the platform as long as you have. Is it an issue of sunk-cost fallacy? Is your Google Home experience not as bad as other people's? Do you use your smart speakers infrequently enough that you can live with a few bugs here and there?
Why are you still using Google Home in 2025?
618 votes
I've invested too much time/money into it.
69 %
The bugs and glitches don't bother me that much.
16 %
My experience has been seamless and bug-free.
8 %
Other (let us know in the comments).
6 %
No matter how long you've been a Google Home user and wherever you find yourself — completely fed up with the platform or happy to continue with it — I'd love to hear from you, from one former Google Home user to another.
Vote in the poll above and sound off with more thoughts in the comments below, and let's keep the conversation going there.
