Google Nest Hub second-gen announced
- Google announced the second generation Nest Hub Smart Display.
- It has bedside sleep tracking built in to keep track of your movement patterns, breathing, and more.
- The new Smart Display is similar to the original, but has more bass and a completely improved sound.
We could all use a little more sleep. Not everyone owns a fitness tracker to wear to bed, and everyone doesn’t want to wear one. For this reason, Google has integrated bedside sleep tracking into the new Google Nest Hub (second generation).
On the surface, the new smart display looks very similar to the original model. It has a 7-inch display with a resolution of 1024 x 600, chunky bezels, and no camera. The audio output should be improved with the new device: According to Google, the speaker has been improved and supposedly offers 50% more bass. There is also a third microphone that allows you to record your voice prompts a little more often. Also, this time around, there’s a machine learning chip on the device that allows the display to process a lot more information on the device to give you answers much faster.
Like the Google Pixel 4 series, the new Nest Hub also has the integrated Soli motion sensing chip from Google, which really opens up new functions for the display. It doesn’t have the same motion capabilities as the Pixel 4, but you can wave your hand to turn off an alarm, for example.
Speaking of sleep, the Nest Hub (2nd generation) can actually track your sleep. Not only that, Google actually claims it can be improve your sleep. Read on below.
With the help of the new Soli sensor – in addition to ambient noise, light and the built-in temperature sensor in your room – the new smart display tracks your movement patterns, breathing, coughing and the length of your sleep. It can even track when you snore! I know a lot of people who will benefit from this feature alone. When you wake up, you will see an easy-to-read sleep analysis on the device. This sleep data is also uploaded to Google Fit if you’d rather see it on your phone. You can see your total sleep time, quality, room temperature overnight, snoring, coughing and whether your room lighting affects your sleep.
At this point, you might be a little bit concerned about privacy. According to Google, the recorded raw audio and solos remain on the device and are not sent to Google, although extrapolated data on sleep events is sent to the company’s servers. You can of course delete any data that you don’t want Google to have access to, e.g. B. if you had a busy night.
It’s not just about audio, however. I am sure that if something is looking at you while you sleep, you will also get into conflict. Thankfully, Google’s presentation calmed us down. Here’s what the Nest Hub actually sees when it tracks your sleep:
Once the data is uploaded to Google Fit, you can view it along with other fitness tracking data that your wearable has collected. If you wear another sleep tracker in bed, Google Fit will ask you to prioritize a sleep tracker. So you can get detailed sleep phases from your Withings ScanWatch as well as breath tracking from the smart display. It’s one or the other.
Sleep Sensing (Google’s name for Sleep Tracking) is fully activated and can be deactivated at any time. Unfortunately, this will be a paid feature. All new Nest Hub owners will have a free preview of Sleep Sensing until 2022. Then you have to pay for the function. However, Google didn’t tell us how to pay for the service. So it’s unclear whether it’s a separate monthly / yearly fee tied to Google One or something else.
There are some limitations. Since the Nest Hub is non-portable and only tracks your breathing rate and disturbances during the night, it cannot track your sleep phases like most other wrist-worn devices.
If you sleep in your bed with a large dog, this may not be the sleep tracker for you. According to Google, variables like a dog jumping on your bed in the middle of the night to sleep can affect Nest Hub’s sleep data. In a perfect world, the Nest Hub will only have a look at your body and will not be able to detect movement from anyone else on your bed. Google assures us that this shouldn’t be a problem for people sleeping next to a human partner, but those with busy nighttime routines may have to look elsewhere.
Interested? The second generation Nest Hub is available to pre-order now from the Google Store and other retailers for $ 99.99 in chalk, charcoal, sand, and fog. Pre-orders are available in the US, UK, Canada, Germany, France and Australia. Additional regions will be announced at a later date.
