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Ok Google, what's up with the Google Assistant's voice activation feature?

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By Adrian Diaconescu

Published: Aug 07, 2018, 7:18 AM

Ok Google, what's up with the Google Assistant's voice activation feature?

It’s taken Google only a little over two years to make its eponymous virtual assistant smarter than market veterans Siri, Alexa, and Cortana, but the stability of the AI-powered service is not always on par with its versatility and growing pervasiveness on all kinds of smart devices.

There’s more than one way to activate your Android phone’s Google Assistant, but arguably the most convenient method seems to be currently broken for a worrying number of users worldwide.

What’s most vexing is the issue has been reported on many different devices from many different companies, including Samsung, LG, Huawei, OnePlus, and Xiaomi. Google is aware of the problem and investigating its root cause, but there’s no word on when we can expect a fix and nothing we could find about any sort of a workaround on Reddit, Twitter, or the search giant’s own support webpages.

The glitch is as easy to describe as it is annoying, with “Ok Google” activation disabled out of the blue. That means many people can no longer get the Google Assistant to wake up merely using their voice, instead having to touch and hold the home button on their phones like barbarians.

All joking aside, while this is obviously not a critical bug impacting the security of Android handsets or the general user experience, plenty of folks appear to rely on the Google Assistant’s voice trigger for everyday tasks and actions, expressing their frustration across social media and eagerly awaiting a solution.

sources: Reddit, Twitter, Google Support via Android Police

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Adrian, a mobile technology enthusiast since the Nokia 3310 era, has been a dynamic presence in the tech journalism field, contributing to Android Authority, Digital Trends, and Pocketnow before joining PhoneArena in 2018. His expertise spans across various platforms, with a particular fondness for the diversity of the Android ecosystem. Despite the challenges of balancing full-time parenthood with his work, Adrian's passion for tech trends, running, and movies keeps him energized. His commitment to mid-range smartphones has led to an eclectic collection of devices, saved from personal bankruptcy by his preference for 'adequate' over 'overpriced'.

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