- By Vikas Yadav
- Sun, 04 Feb 2024 05:17 PM (IST)
- Source:JND
South Korean giant Samsung introduced Google Assistant support for its TV offerings in late 2020. It was accommodated next to the company's in-house Bixby and Amazon's Alexa virtual assistants to let users navigate across the UI, control devices, open apps and perform other operations. It must be configured on the TV and connected to a user's phone. However, Samsung is all set to remove the voice assistant of Google from its TVs in March this year.
This implies that February will be the last month to utilise Google Assistant on Samsung TVs for voice-enabled tasks. The change is due to a policy update by the search leader. In Samsung's Tizen OS, users can continue to use Amazon Alexa or Bixby to accomplish voice commands and perform activities in the UI. The policy change might not come as a shocker as Google Assistant was unavailable across the brand's 2023 lineup of televisions, according to 9To5Google.
Screengrab of Samsung's US support page. (Image:Samsung)
"Due to a change in Google's policy, Google Assistant will no longer be available on Samsung TVs beginning March 1st, 2024," Samsung said on its US support site. With the recent change, Google Assistant will also exit the existing models that include:
- All 2022 Smart TV models
- All 2021 Smart TV models
- 2020 8K and 4K QLED TVs
- 2020 Crystal UHD TVs
- 2020 Lifestyle TVs (Frame, Serif, Terrace, and Sero)
In the current scheme, users can press the Microphone button on their remote to open Google Assistant and enter commands. It seems the policy change is only impacting Samsung TVs. LG TVs that run on webOS continue to support Google Assistant without any changes, at least at the time of filing. For the unaware, Google's voice assistant is among the basic offerings in TVs of top makers such as Sony, Panasonic, LG, TCL, and more. It also comes in-built in Google TV OS.