Bixby vs Google Assistant
The comparison below is based on multiple factors such as cross-platform availability, UI, features, and more. Let’s get started.
Cross-Platform Availability
Google Assistant is available everywhere. You can shout ‘Ok Google’ or ‘Hey Google‘ and access Google’s digital assistant on Android, iOS, popular smart speakers, via Android Auto in a car, Android TV, and Android Watch. Bixby is tightly integrated in Samsung’s eco-system of hardware. It is available on Samsung smartphones, smart TVs, and Tizen-based smartwatches. You can’t access it on other devices.
How to Access Bixby or Google Assistant
The most standard way to access Bixby or Google Assistant is by using the hotkey to wake up the assistant on the device. For Bixby, you can use ‘Hey Bixby’ and for Google, you have two options – ‘Ok Google’ and ‘Hey Google’ key phrases. Samsung has integrated Bixby right into the Power button on Galaxy devices. Just press and hold the power button to wake up Bixby and ask question or complete tasks. As for Google Assistant, you need to swipe from either bottom corners of the device and jump right into Google Assistant UI. As noted earlier, you can also activate it with voice.
Languages Support
Before we talk about how smart Bixby and Google Assistant are at answering your queries, let’s take a look at the languages they can speak and understand. Google Assistant support 12 languages as of April 2021. They include all the popular dialects such as English, Hindi, Dutch, Spanish, and more. Bixby pales in comparison here. Samsung’s digital assistant understands English, Korean, Chinese, Italian, Spanish, Britain English, German, and Indian English.
Features
Here is where it gets interesting. Let’s get one thing straight. In our testing, Google Assistant did way better at recognizing queries and questions. You have better chance at getting a proper answer from Google Assistant than Bibxy. Let’s take a look at major Google Assistant features. Google Assistant used to be a slow affair earlier. However, it received a huge performance boost with the Google Assistant 2.0 update. First of all, both Google Assistant and Bixby supports voice and keyboard input to ask queries and questions. With Google Assistant, you can send a message, open an app, check weather, and even send a WhatsApp message. Google Assistant can also perform simple tricks such a rolling a dice, flipping a coin, and answer complex questions like ‘What’s the day on March 24, 2024’ and it will give you the exact answer. Users can opt for the Google Assistant home and create a personalized home experience with multiple cards such as Calendar, Weather, Reminders, Bills, Movie tickets, Shopping list, and more. The app works perfectly fine with other Google apps too. One can ask query like, ‘Play Biology videos on YouTube’, ‘Show me photos from last summer’, ‘Read my WhatsApp messages’, and so on. There is a handy Explore section in the app to see how others are using Google Assistant on their devices. You can also connect Google Assistant to smart home devices and ask it to turn on lights, turn off fan, dim the light, and so on. The biggest difference between Bixby and Google Assistant is their approach. Bixby focuses more on offline actions on the device. Bixby routines is one such killer feature by Samsung that’s centered around the IFTTT (If this then that) concept. You can set multiple Bixby commands like below.
Say “Good Morning” and Bixby will turn off DND mode, enable AOD (Always On Display), announce today’s date, weather, schedule, and read the headline news. You can say, ‘Hey Bixby, I’m driving’ and Bixby will automatically turn on Bluetooth, turn off Wi-Fi, and play your favorite commute playlist.
Neat, isn’t it? The possibilities are endless here. Samsung has also added capsules that go perfectly fine with Samsung apps and devices. You can say, ‘Hey Bixby, Connect to TV’, and Bixby will enable and use the Smart View. Shout ‘Optimize my device’ and Bixby will open the device care app and free up space by deleting junk files and cache. Want to see at which time Apple’s hardware event will start in your region? You can ask, Hey Bixby, “What time is it in New Delhi when it’s 10 AM in California?”
Wrapping Up: Bixby vs Google Assistant
You can always use Bixby and Google Assistant side-by-side. In our experience, you should use Google Assistant to get answer to your queries and complex questions. Plus, it works with more devices than Bixby. Samsung’s digital assistant shines when it comes to on-device operations and offline commands.
