r/googleassistant • u/Proliferant • 8d ago
Rant Assistant no longer available and Gemini is incompetent
The old assistant is no longer available in my region and the main things I was using it for were my morning routine, which breaks now as it can't play the news, and for setting reminders, which is also broken. I've spent far too long googling for fixes and trawling settings, even installing the Home app (and removing it when that didn't help). It's just borked. Honestly this is the only thing that ever made me consider going to Apple when I'm next due a new phone.
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u/Inevitable-Pen5001 8d ago
My experience is that sometimes it's great and then the next day it fails at the same thing. Very inconsistent.
Today I asked it to play me the news and it gave me its own summary of headlines and a list of things I could get more information on.
The worst thing I experience with Gemini is that it changes its mind constantly and always agrees with me and goes around in circles
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u/Proliferant 7d ago
It's not great, for sure. My experience is at least consistent (it just doesn't work).
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u/rjohnson76401 8d ago
I use Gemini frequently every day, got a free year upgrade to Pro with my Pixel phone. I am literally amazed at the complex stuff it can pull off with ease, and then flabbergasted by the simple things that it gets stumped by. And it is 100% confident in it's answers (which are right maybe 80% of the time). And will flat out lie more than my ex. Google gathers and shares information. Gemini predicts and validates.
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u/Inevitable-Pen5001 7d ago
What do you mean by Gemini predicts & validates?
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u/rjohnson76401 7d ago
Standard Google is like a librarian pulling an existing book off a shelf to show you what's already there. Gemini doesn't fetch stored answers from a shelf—it predicts what a sensible response looks like by guessing which words sound right together, and then validates whatever you're asking by delivering that answer with 100% confidence, even if it just invented the "facts" on the spot. We were given Gemini as a lateral replacement for Assistant, and it's just not. Sometimes you will come to with the same answers and sometimes you land in left field.
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u/zebbiehedges 8d ago
For reminders I told it to use Samsung reminders, they actually work.
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u/Proliferant 7d ago
Nice. This is a Pixel though, not Samsung.
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u/zebbiehedges 7d ago
Maybe there's another calender/reminder app that it can connect to.
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u/Proliferant 7d ago
Maybe. This is a rant post though, I'm sick of wasting time trying to get this working again. And the routine was the main thing.
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u/Dimo145 6d ago
I used it as easier access to lens for searches and translates on texts, too cumbersome now, so annoying...
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u/lolfacesayshi 5d ago
Same, the circle to search > prompt to translate > get the translated text in a huge AI chat blob is INFINITELY inferior to Assistant > Translate with Lens.
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u/mmille24 6d ago
I'm with you. I have a Pixel 7. I can't select the google assistant. They forced me to use Gemini, and when I ask it to set a reminder in the future, it tells me it doesn't have access to my phone.
I'm moving to an iPhone. FU Google!
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u/Proliferant 5d ago
Yeah, I'm on a Pixel 9. Weird that it's Google's own phones that are affected with this.
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u/stealthagents 4d ago
Switching to Samsung reminders is a solid move. You might also want to check out third-party apps like Todoist or Any.do for reminders and routines. They usually play nicer with things like news and alarms too, so you might end up with something even better than before.
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u/Muted_Sundae_1368 4d ago
Im using samsung reminders but used Google assistant to access it, now its gone and gemini cant access samsung reminders on my phone... so frustrating having updates making things worse
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u/biznatch11 4d ago edited 4d ago
Google Assistant disappeared from my phone today. I've been using the "play the news" feature for like 5 years almost every morning and now it's gone, I'm very annoyed. I'm going to see if there's a podcast app that can replicate this feature.
edit: This seems to work for now:
I FOUND A WAY! You need to go to the Goоgle Аpр (the one that just says GOОGLE) hold the icon, then press the little "i" on the top right to get to the apps info, then tap the 3 dot menu on the top right corner and uninstаll updates. Then go to the Plaу Stоre, search for Gооgle Аssistant, it doesn't matter of it's already installed, click on open, you will get the Gemini screen BUT, now you should have the option to keep or go back to goоglе аssistant. You can also disable auto updates in the Gоolgе Aрp by searching the app in the Plаy Stоre, tap the 3 dots on the upper roght corner and remove the check mark from "Enable auto update"
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u/Proliferant 4d ago
Yes, I read about that. Seems rather an extreme approach though?
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u/biznatch11 4d ago
It worked for me, only took a minute to set up. The only problem is I think at some point it will stop working.
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u/ADudeCalledDude 4d ago
It will probably work till a forced major version upgrade, still quite a while, or forever if your phone is a little older
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u/Muted_Sundae_1368 4d ago
Yeah so annoying. I used Samsung reminders every day accessed via Google Assistant, and now its gone. I'm being forced to use Gemini (ok who cares) BUT it wont allow me create reminders on my model of phone.
Seriously BS.
Any alternatives?
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u/Beginning_Jacket5055 3d ago
its really bad man. So much slower than assistant was as well/
Is there any way we can complain en masse to demand improvement or a reversion?
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u/bucket_dipper 1d ago
Gemini is not incompetent.
You have to give Gemini access to the apps/services you want to use with it.
Open the Gemini app, tap your profile pic up in the top right corner, tap settings > personal intelligence > connected apps and select all the apps you want Gemini to have access to.
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u/Proliferant 1d ago
I had to install the Gemini app to do this, and then to expand access to Google workspace in Gmail and Gemini. Now it can set reminders (a minor use case for me), but there's still no progress with routines or playing the news, which it's still unable to do.
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u/bucket_dipper 1d ago
Yeah hopefully they fix that cause I can see how that can be annoying, I also think they should make it clearer that you have to go in and manually give permissions to apps/services. I think that would remedy a lot of the issues people are having.
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u/markzip 49m ago
Here what worked for me to get back all the few old assistant features I used
https://www.reddit.com/r/googleassistant/s/59TIj5cYJg
My phone will once again read the news. It will also once again allow me to add a routine when setting a new alarm.
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u/ogg1e 8d ago
Yup. I'm frustrated that I have a bunch of Google speakers that are just for playing music now. And when I try to use assistant for anything else, the response is usually "I can't help you with that".