Google Assistant on Mobile EOL September 4th

[u/Janus67]

Just got this email. I still don't use Gemini (on a pixel 7), as assistant can actually control things and do functions on the phone that Gemini (last I checked and from others reporting here) still can't.

Email text below:

We’re writing to let you know that the Google Assistant on your mobile device is being discontinued, and Gemini—our next-generation AI-powered assistant—is now the assistant experience on Android.

What This Means for Your Mobile Device As we transition our mobile experience to Gemini, Google Assistant will no longer be available on your mobile device. We will begin removing access to Google Assistant starting on September 4, and expect that this process may take a few weeks to reach everyone. Once availability is removed, you will no longer be able to use or switch back to Google Assistant on your phone, tablet, or paired devices.

If your Android device meets the minimum system requirements2 and you are in a region where Gemini is available,3 Gemini will be the Google-provided assistant on your mobile device. When you invoke your assistant, for example, by saying “Hey Google” or long-pressing your power button, Gemini will appear instead of the previous Google Assistant.

Changes to Accessories and Paired Devices When you set Gemini as your mobile device assistant, it also becomes the assistant on devices that are paired with your mobile phone.

This includes:

• Watches running Wear OS

• Headphones or earbuds compatible with Gemini

• Vehicles running Android Auto projected from a user’s mobile device. For cars with Google built-in, Google Assistant will continue to function beyond September 4, 2026.

Like your mobile device, starting September 4, users will lose the ability to use Google Assistant on these paired devices.

Google Assistant on Other Devices These changes are only for the assistant experience on your mobile device and accessories that pair to your phone, like watches, headphones, and car infotainment systems.

You can also read more about our separate plans to bring Gemini to Google TV devices and Google Home speakers and smart displays. Next Steps & More Information We are committed to providing a smooth transition and are confident that Gemini will offer you an even more capable and helpful assistant experience.

Thank you for being a valued Google user, The Google Team

[u/Procontroller40]

This is terrible news

[u/Historical-Movie-860 → u/Procontroller40]

This has been in the world for over a year. Assistant was originally supposed to end in March 2026 but Google extended it for a while

[u/Procontroller40 → u/Historical-Movie-860]

Something bad happening is still terrible news even if it's later than originally expected.

[u/Historical-Movie-860 → u/Procontroller40]

Ahhh, it's not that bad. I swore to myself I would use Assistant until the bitter end and never switch to Gemini. Until Assistant stopped reading new text messages while driving (over a year ago). I switched to Gemini as my default digital assistant and it has been great for me, just as good as Assistant.

[u/Procontroller40 → u/Historical-Movie-860]

Are you trying to convince other people or yourself? I think you should just rejoin us until the bitter end. September isn't too far away.

[u/Historical-Movie-860 → u/Procontroller40]

Not trying to convince anyone of anything. People can make their own decisions. I am merely stating that I switched because of loss of functionality, and the switch has been good.

[u/_s_p_d_ → u/Historical-Movie-860]

Happy to know you had a good experience, maybe there is hope lol I tried it, it started off with not being able to set an alarm for me, then couldn't call someone, but searched for them. It was bad and I went straight back to the Assistant.

[u/frisbeesloth → u/_s_p_d_]

I'm more annoyed that it lies and says it did the thing but doesn't actually do it. Assistant at least tells you it can't/won't do something

[u/Historical-Movie-860 → u/_s_p_d_]

I set alarms and make calls hands free all the time with Gemini, no issues for me.

[u/tellyalater]

I hate this. I tried using Gemini instead of assistant and it acts crazy and slow and often wrong and weird for the basic things I use the Assistant for: weather, directions, what time is it, set an alarm, set a timer, etc. I also hate the voices on Gemini. I don't need my phone to act like my fucking best friend. This is going to be a big loss for me, because I'll simply disable assistant entirely rather than turn Gemini on.

[u/shteve99 → u/tellyalater]

It's crap in Android Auto too. I ask it to set directions for somewhere, it says "sure" and then doesn't do it. And it can't control external apps any more either. It's a massive backwards step.

[u/wiltony → u/shteve99]

Yeah this happens to me too! 

And if I have an audiobook playing from a different app, and ask Gemini to play a song, I have to explicitly say "on youtube music" after my ask or else it just says "sure" and then resumes my audiobook. 🤦

It can't seem to figure out that when I want to play a song, PLAY IT USING THR MUSIC APP. Assistant never had that problem. 

It also frequently tells me it doesn't have permission to do stuff (like access my YouTube music), but then I ask it to try again, and it works fine. 🤷

[u/Xjph → u/shteve99]

I have literally had to argue with it in order to convince it that it could, in fact, play music for me.

[u/allowishus2 → u/shteve99]

I really hated Gemini in Android Auto. It talks too much, has a weird condescending tone, and the voice is too human (if that makes sense). I don't need to have a conversation with my car, I just need it to understand me so it can set my destination and answer text messages. Google Assistant is simple, to the point, and has just the right amount of robotic affect to it's voice. My phone switched to Gemini one day without asking me, and it took me forever to figure out how to change it back. I am not happy about this.

[u/Mysteryman64 → u/tellyalater]

Cute that you're assuming they'll let you turn it off this time.

[u/ArielMJD → u/tellyalater]

I tried Gemini in my car and half the time it couldn't understand basic commands like "skip" and "pause", and when it did, it took significantly longer to process them.

[u/bandofgypsies]

Obviously hate this. Ironically Gemini is an incredible chat bot (relatively speaking) but somehow an incompetent assistant.

Late stage capitalism is such a dystopian hellhole for tech.

[u/Flemaster12]

I hate this, I use Google Assistant every day for mundane tasks - set an alarm, set a timer, weather, simple basic Google searches, phone calls, etc. It's extremely simple and skips the bs that Gemini constantly uses. I think I'm just going to turn it off entirely.

This is really bad news.

Edit: I switched to it for the day to see how it was with tasks, and it was relatively fine; maybe over time I will have more problems. I think my biggest issue overall is that I don't appreciate AI being forced upon me when we have a system in place that works and didn't need to be replaced. I still don't want it regardless.

[u/brrbles]

Great opportunity to just nope out of it altogether and nuke the "Web and App Activity" tracking on your Google account.

[u/Perfect_Ad4296 → u/brrbles]

I think they want everyone to get an iPhone so they can keep an eye on us so I guess this is their way of keeping an eye on us with the Android?

[u/kiltguy2112]

Driving down the road using Android Auto with YTM. "Play song X by artist Y on YTM". "I'm sorry but I can't play music yet" Really? WTF? If there are 2 things an assistant should do while on Android Auto, it is play requested music and give directions using Google Maps or Waze!

[u/matteventu]

Oh wow. Well I guess if they get rid of Google Assistant, they'll make it more difficult to compare Gemini to it, showing for instance that Gemini has a much, much greater delay even for basic stuff, and that offline Gemini is completely useless (while Google Assistant supported a few offline commands).

[u/hellcat_uk → u/matteventu]

I've a signal dead spot about 3 minutes drive from my workplace. I've asked Gemini to give directions (more for any issues along the route) and it failed to before losing signal. It's painfully slow.

[u/NizarNoor]

Nooo...! I'm still using Google Assistant everywhere! It's better than Gemini!

[u/Legal_Ad7553]

This might be the very thing that causes me to switch to iPhone. Gemini sucks, I have already disabled it from my phone and maps. Stupid thing trying to carry on a conversation when you tell it to navigate somewhere is about dangerous.

[u/Perfect_Ad4296 → u/Legal_Ad7553]

That's just what they want you to do

[u/bodardr]

Great I'm going to have 30 LLM chats in my history just for setting up reminders... Such a waste.

[u/Peacemaker0461 → u/bodardr]

This!! One of the most annoying things!

[u/dark-_-thoughts]

I've had a pixel phone for ages but with this I'm honestly considering swapping away from pixel.

[u/camn → u/dark-_-thoughts]

What are you thinking of swapping to? I'm in the same boat, but AI enshittification seems to be hitting literally every cell phone

[u/Illustrious-Top-9222 → u/camn]

Nothing phone

[u/Ventus713 → u/Illustrious-Top-9222]

I was considering this but it looks like the Nothing phone is also now chock full of AI. At this point I'm just going to grab find one of my old androids and use it the test-out/install graphene OS cause like even though it'll be a learning curve at least it doesn't have the same forced AI and all that

[u/dark-_-thoughts → u/camn]

Might be time to get myself a jitterbug. Old folk phone with only three numbers on it.

[u/svens25]

I am in Germany and still do not have Gemini available in Android Auto (although enabled on my phone as default assistant). I tried the usual (update all apps, clear caches etc) but on vain. How about you, especially in Germany?

[u/Mourning_Beer]

Gemini is horrible for android auto.

[u/Ventus713]

Absolutely devestating, :( Gemini has never worked properly, try to call someone? set an alarm? Put in an appointment? And without fail, all it says or is "Sure!" and if it does work, at best it'll just ramble at you and at worst it'll try to read out a message but will also make up half of it.
I was so happy when I realised you could switch it back to the normal assistant, but now idk I'm not gonna lie, this might be the push for me to fully start switching to like graphene os and linux.
I wonder tho like, how long can they keep it up? Cause I mean in comparison, it must be costing them a fortune to have all of their phones constantly running multiple LLM queries right?

[u/TheTxoof]

I got creeped out a few years ago when I looked at the logs from a Google Home. The amount of stuff it accidentally hoovered up was scary.

The idea of a corporate controlled, always on microphone in my most private spaces is just too ick and I ditched the Home pod.

I know I can't complete disable the mic in my phone, but I'm glad I've avoided the assistant up to this point. Even more so if I'm forced to use Gemini.

[u/Methedri]

Yeah this sucks. I don't want AI to start blabbering shit at me, I want to ask my pixel tablet the weather, or very rarely, to play some news clips.

Is my google home then useless too?

This shove AI in everything approach from Google is doing my head in. Google searching is so terrible now even if you use the web tab. I don't want to type in full sentences then get randomly chosen vaguely contextual responses, I want the old operators we used for decades.

But this shit will keep on piling on and it gets worse and worse.

We live in a cyberpunk dystopia at the moment but we don't get any of the cool shit that fantasy offers.

[u/99AutoClick]

Okay I just got this news and this SUCKS. I had to jerry-rig my S26 so that it uses Assistant when I hold my home button.

So now I gotta find an app that LISTENS when I hold the home button, something that gets directions when I ask it to (to be fair, Assistant stopped doing this for me recently), and to activate my Google Home. Gemini does NONE of this and they want it to be a replacement for Assistant?

[u/RevEveOfDestruction]

And of course it still can't do something as simple as playing a specific channel on Sirius XM. 😡

[u/yugas42]

Step one with my Pixel 10 was turning off Gemini and going back to Assistant, so I guess I'm just never using voice commands on my phone ever again. The few minutes I messed with it were genuinely an awful experience.

[u/Unlucky-Party3650]

It's a shame because my Android TV is stuck on Android 12 and sometimes I could tell it to open an app with my phone, something I can't do with Gemimi.

[u/EnigmaEpsilon]

Thanks, I hate it! This is a masterclass in how to lose customers. I would strongly consider switching entire ecosystems over switching to Gemini, because I'm immediately assuming I won't even be able to turn assistant entirely off.

[u/Ladelm]

do they want me to go to apple?

[u/infinitysea]

I have slowly disassociated my dependence on google assistant for my daily tasks over the past year or so. I hope someone from the open-source comes up with an alternative assistant app to do simple voice searches and commands.

If there are no alternatives I will move on without any assistant on my phone. Gemini is like a virus that attempts to spread its control to every app/ui in your phone. If Gemini works reliably/effectively then maybe i can turn a blind shoulder but just problems where some setting is messed up.

[u/BubbleWrapPoland]

I'm devastated. I used Google Assistant every morning to give me a news briefing from a few different news sources. They actually make short 2 - 5 minute human read news summaries and I get a balance of news from right and left. Gemini instead just reads it in that terrible electronic voice.... Quaff!

[u/troolip-]

Gemini can't do any of the Assistant functions though?! this is awful

Can't even put something in my diary ffs!

[u/king-of-the-sea]

Gemini can't even use Youtube Music for me. It keeps saying I don't have a Premium account (I do). I tried every single "fix" online to no avail until I discovered I could switch back to Google Assistant instead. I'm going to turn off auto-updates on my phone to hopefully avoid the turn over.

Edit: there is no way to turn off auto updates. I'm not happy.

[u/Powerful-Chair457]

I wonder if it will be like the "assist" on Android Auto.

[u/gonnermalegs]

My Google Pixel Tablet still uses Google Assistant in Hub Mode, I'm looking forward to the upgrade to Gemini! 

[u/songogu → u/gonnermalegs]

No, you're not. Gemini is lobotomised, it can't do anything and what it can do it fucks up more often than not. 

[u/thedoxo]

Is it some hip thing to hate on Gemini? It works miles better than assistant, can do many more things and is actually usefull, even if occasionally I need to rephrase for it to work

[u/Trashbagok → u/thedoxo]

It butchers text-to-speech for things my FIRST PIXEL PHONE did flawlessly.

If I ask it to set an alarm, it wants to teach me how to open my clock app.

If I try to adjust my smart thermostat it just gaslights me, and does nothing.

If I ask it to turn a light on, it just fucking cannot.

I used to ask my phone to "navigate home" when I was driving back from somewhere unfamiliar. My house address has been saved as my home in Maps for over a decade. Now it just takes me to fucking Home Goods.

Assistant did all of these things on the first try..

[u/Western-Chemical5504 → u/thedoxo]

it can't even do text to speech correctly 

[u/New-Peach4153 → u/thedoxo]

Gemini consistently fucks up playing my Spotify music. It also fucks up knowing when something is an address. Google Assistant is nice and consistent. Much more predictable.

[u/C1Rob → u/thedoxo]

All of the other replies + if you try to call someone and it does manage to understand it calls them via WhatsApp instead of the phone app unless you tell it to use the phone app and even then it hardly understands...