August Adds Support for DoorSense in Google Assistant, Arlo Picks Up Camera Commands

This week, two of the bigger names in the smart home world expanded or added Google Assistant functionality to their products. I’m talking about August and Arlo, two companies whose products should probably be on your short list if you are considering diving into a connected home.

For August, its newest Smart Lock and Smart Lock Pro gained a Google Assistant command that utilizes their DoorSense technology. With DoorSense, August Smart Locks can tell you if your door is open or not, so this command let’s you ask Assistant, “Hey Google, is my door closed?” and get an answer.

You can also ask Google Assistant to lock your doors with August locks on them, but that’s not a new command.

In the world of Arlo smart security cameras, we now have the ability to say, “OK google, show front door camera on living room TV.” Or you could do that with your garage cameras or kid’s room camera, etc. to pull up a feed on a supported Android TV device or Chromecast.

One of our readers who owns Arlo cameras told us this morning that there was at least a 10 second delay between the time he asked Assistant to show one of his cameras on his Shield (both are hard-wired). That’s certainly not that quick, especially if you are attempting to pull up the feed because your camera noticed motion and you want to check on it. I’d imagine functionality like that will speed up over time.

This new Assistant feature works with Arlo Pro 2, Arlo Pro, Arlo Go, Arlo Baby, Arlo Q, and Arlo Q Plus.

// August | Arlo [2]

Cheers Eric!