2017 Holiday Gift Guide to Smarter Home Automation

Alexa, Siri, and Hey Google – The Three New Magi of The Holidays

If you and your home have not yet been visited by one of the three wise kings – (of technology) today’s best known personal assistants from Amazon, Apple and Google – then you are almost certainly wondering which one will be the best to share wisdom with you, help you run your home, and entertain you.

First – you don’t have to think of these devices as mutually exclusive. I have an Echo and 3 Echo Dots in my house, with the Echo in my home theater. My home theater is also home to a Google Home, and, of course, to Siri, since my iPhone is always with me, and I use an iPad to control much of my home theater. Siri is pretty much the touch of a button away. I don’t own an apple watch, but am envious of how that elevates Siri’s game when it comes to convenience.

So far I don’t use Google Home to control devices (I could), but I can control 90%+ of the smart devices in my home by voice using Alexa, and about half with Apple’s Siri using my iPhone or other Apple devices.

Sometimes I prefer calling on Siri on my phone rather than shouting to Alexa across the room, but with Dots scattered around my home, there’s almost always a Dot within shouting distance. On devices controlled by either, I tend to use Alexa more, but that will likely balance out when I have Apple speakers also lurking on kitchen counters and bedroom dressers.

Let’s look back. By far, the oldest is Siri, who dates back about a decade! Amazon’s Alexa, by comparison, has been around about three years, since first sold by invitation and to early Prime members, and mass sales since June of 2015. Google Home is barely a year old (hard to believe)! While Siri first appeared as an iPhone capability, the other two first introduced themselves to us as, for lack of a better term, as the Smart in smart speakers – the Amazon Echo, and Google Home.

Today, we await Apple’s first Siri controlled smart speaker system, equivalent to Echo and Home, while at the same time, we see Alexa being embedded into lots of third party products, and Google dramatically expanding the number of smart devices it can control. If you are a home automation type person like I am, you can appreciate that Alexa can control far more products than the others, but while Siri, Hey Google are playing catch up in that department, you find that each of these three has their own strengths.

I’m going to talk about a few of those here, briefly, and then focus on which might be the best one for you.

Which New Wise King is Your Best Choice?

As I see it right now, here are each of the three, and their key strengths:

Amazon – offers a full line of Echo products, from low cost Dots to specialty devices like Show. And, as just mentioned, there are more light switches, smart bulbs, video doorbells, smart locks, refrigerators, etc. that work with Alexa than any of her fellow AIs.

Apple – Siri has the advantage of Apple’s ecosystem behind her/him. We Apple folks appreciate that system. There are great synergies, which is why few leave the Apple fold.  Count that as relating to ease of use, less hassle, but Apple has something else going on, which is both a plus and a minus. Apple’s HomeKit – their overall solution, demands a higher level of security than the others do. Put simplistically, if you want your devices to be controlled by Siri, they need to meet Apple’s security guidelines.

As one lock manufacturer told me, they had existing smart locks, (which, by the way, Alexa and Google Home can control through Z-wave/Wifi hubs), that they worked with to make that voice control possible. But to do the same with Apple Siri, it took them many months of engineering more security in, to make their product less hackable, before it qualified to be Siri/HomeKit compatible. Translated, you keep hearing about how hackers can get into your system though poorly protected baby monitor cameras, smart light switches, smart refrigerators etc. Well, the theory is, Apple’s extra security means that if you are using their system and Siri, the baby monitor camera, fridge, etc. will have extra protection and will not be the conduit for a hack!

That’s great stuff, but it also means that Apple has been slow to get products to work with them. It’s less about companies wanting to as it is about taking more resources and more time to bring those products to market. For example, I use a number of color and white LIFX smart bulbs in my home. I installed the first of them more than a year ago (and reviewed them). Alexa has no problem controlling them, but Siri couldn’t. Starting a couple of months ago, all LIFX’s new products now meet Apples requirements and work with Siri. The older ones – sorry, I still can’t control them directly with Siri, but there is a controller you can buy to “upgrade” your LIFX lights to work with Siri. A year ago, there were few products supporting Siri, the good news is that thanks to another year of time, now the market is being flooded with Siri controllable products, even if Siri is still well behind Alexa.

Google Assistant – Google is playing catch up with Alexa. Unlike Apple Siri/Homekit, and more like Alexa, Google doesn’t seem to make major demands that Apple requires of smart device manufacturers, so you just might think that Google Home falls short of Alexa overall. Not so, as is quickly caught up in terms of devices it can control and it has already carved out an area where it excels for the moment.

I love that Hey Google can now recognize our voices. That’s great, as that means Hey Google knows whether I’m talking to it, or my wife is. If I want music played, it will look to my playlists. If Lori (that’s my wife) asks for music, it will look to hers. That makes it easy to also keep separate appointments, calendars, shopping preferences, etc.

A key point for your consideration: The status quo doesn’t last long in this field. Today, Alexa may be number one in interfacing, Google might be #1 at answering obscure questions, and Apple may be best at security and perhaps ease of learning – but a year from now, that may all change. The rate of improvement and capability expansion for these products is only going to accelerate. A year from now Google may well have the most devices supporting it (that one’s not likely to shift to Apple because of the extra security). Siri may become the smartest AI again, (I don’t think she is anymore), and so on.

Guess what! I think it’s a safe bet that by the holidays next year, all three will be recognizing different voices. I think by this time next year, the number of devices controlled by each will be a far closer contest than today. I think that Apple will have shipped a few million of their own smart speakers (which we all just heard that their announced first smart speaker system will be delayed until January).

The Bottom Line: Which One to Buy?

If you are an Apple fan – aka fan of their ecosystem, Siri is the obvious choice – if, as always, you have some patience. There are less smart thermostats, door locks, light bulbs etc. that work with Siri, so your choices are more limited, but, there are still plenty of choices. If you aren’t part of the Apple scene, and don’t see a compelling reason to switch, then it’s likely that Apple’s smart speaker isn’t going to get you to going the Apple family.

Alexa is my overall choice – today. That’s primarily because it does interface with more gear. And, Alexa’s pretty darn smart when it comes to answering your knowledge or news questions. There’s also plenty of free music without even joining Prime.

At first I thought the Google Home answered more questions, and better than Alexa, but not so much anymore. If you have a family, though, and want to take advantage of Hey Google recognizing and keeping everyone straight, go for it. Whatever shortfall it has in the number of devices supported, figure that within a year, there probably won’t be any significant difference.

Ultimately, I won’t be surprised if a lot of Apple folks end up, like me, actively using both Siri and one of the others. Probably Alexa, because, early adopter Apple folks like me already started buying Echos and Dots, when Apple Siri had almost no devices to control.

Non Apple people, you’ll likely just choose and stick with Alexa or Hey Google until at some point a couple or several years down the road, one of these, or someone else will have a system that you deem superior enough to the competition to switch over, despite any hassles.

On the final page of our guide, we will continue our discussion of these three smart personal assistants relating to device compatibility and the current key strengths of each. But first, let’s talk smart locks – hop on over to the next page.