The Google Home ($129) connected wireless speaker has grown up a lot in the six months since it appeared on the scene. With support for multiple users, many more smart home brands, and third-party skills, it's finally a legitimate competitor to the Amazon Echo ecosystem. In some ways, Google Home is even better than Alexa—at handling multiple users, for instance. It hasn't quite caught up yet overall, but it's definitely getting there. Design and Setup The Google Home ($99.00 at Target) is an attractive gourd-shaped speaker with a removable woven gray base—additional fabric ($20) and metal ($20) options are available. It's 3.79 inches in diameter and 5.62 inches tall, and weighs about a pound. It looks like an ornamental candle, and thanks to the fabric base and various color options, it'll fit much more easily into various home decor than Amazon's somewhat utilitarian-looking black or white Echo speakers (even the smaller Echo Dot and Amazon Tap aren't particularly attractive). ...

The Google Home is a great-looking speaker with a voice assistant that's catching up to Amazon's Alexa, although it hasn't quite gotten there yet.

Attractive design; Removable color bases; Well-rounded sound; Multi-room audio

Still fewer skills than Amazon's Alexa; Doesn't work as a standard Bluetooth speaker

At £129, Google Home is a more personalisable connected speaker than those from its leading rivals; Swapping out the ability to buy stuff online using your voice for a better understanding of general queries out the box.

Great microphone performance; Customisable design; Expansive skill set; Effortless setup; Unobtrusive

This smart home device is basically Google's answer to Amazon's extremely popular Echo device and for the most part they are incredibly similar. Both will help you with various tasks and answer questions about weather, news, sports, etc.

Stylish – will blend into home nicely; Dozens of features; Can stream content straight to your TV (YouTube & Netflix; Connects with other smart home devices; Customizable design

More expensive than Echo Dot; Average audio quality; Need Google Audio device to connect with other speakers

I would still consider this a novelty item over being terribly useful. Questions must be phrased the correct way and there have been many things that Google Home cannot help with.

I've been using Google Now/Google Assistant for quite a while and have become used to the quirks of the fairly unimpressive Alexia third party interface I've had for a few months, so when a lot of allergy medication muddled my senses I decided to run to Target to get a Google Home voice activated...

Doesn't understand most questions

Google Home is fun device that excels at answering questions from the Google knowledge graph and integrating with Google services and products. Is it better than Amazon's Echo? Ultimately that'll be down to personal preferences and the services you need.

Google has made the smart speaker race interesting with Google Home. It can do many of the same basic things as Amazon's Echo can, yet it costs less and has more visual appeal. The Echo delivers better sound, and it connects to far more smart devices, but you can expect Home's add-ons to increase...

Integrates with your Google tools; Controls Google Cast-enabled devices; Booming bass

Limited add-ons at this point; Lacks balanced sound; especially on vocals

I took a chance buying this device, because I don't own a Smart Phone, but have a Tablet with Android. That was enough, to get it working, and now it's my main source for music. It will play any song by any artist, that's within u tubes library.

In many ways, Google Home is amazing. It's the all-in-one J.A.R.V.I.S.-like butler we've dreamt of for years. Well, almost. Its smart home controls are no gimmick - it really will make your daily life just that little bit easier, to the point where using anything but your voice to set the...

Looks classy; yet unobtrusive; You can control your home and music like Tony Stark; Search and translate functionality is brilliant

Could sound better; Play Music doesn't support adding to your library/playlists; You can't add appointments; reminders; or send messages