Google Working On AirPods Style Smart Headphones, New Chromebook And Home Speaker

For Google, the second half of the year is likely to remain action-packed with product launches. After it launched Android Oreo on Monday, the tech giant is reportedly working on three new products, apart from the already confirmed Pixel 2 smartphones — a Google Home Mini speaker, a new Chromebook, and most significantly, a new pair of smart headphones that will rival the Apple AirPods.

Voice command-based smart headphones

Google may be working on new smart headphones capable of running Google Assistant, according to 9to5 Google. The tech news website found the information in 7.10 Beta of the Google app, which refers to the device with the codename "Bisto.”

The data mining brought up the following code: "Your headphones have the Google Assistant. Ask it questions. Tell it to do things. It’s your own personal Google, always ready to help.”

The report also revealed the headphone would be capable of letting the user respond to notifications via voice commands. The headphone would have physical buttons, including a special Google Assistant “top button," which users can long-press to ask a search query. Most importantly, according to the report, these headphones would be capable of getting over-the-air software updates. Since the source code refers to Google's proprietary software, it may be possible the tech giant may come up with its own line of headphones.

While the company hasn’t officially revealed any details on these headphones, going by the features, it seems the headphones have been designed to compete with Apple’s AirPods wireless earphones. It would be a logical step for the company to turn the heat on Apple, which has its highly anticipated iPhone 8 in the works, by launching these headphones alongside the Pixel 2, which is expected to give a tough competition to iPhone8. It is, however, not yet clear when the headphones would be launched.

On a rebranding spree

Google also seems to have two new versions of its existing devices in the fray — the Chromebook Pixel and the Google Home Mini. While the Chromebook Pixel launch may help in rebranding the Chromebook brand, Google Home Mini is expected to compete with Amazon Echo Dot, both being miniature versions of existing smart speakers, Android Police reported Monday, citing sources aware of the company's plans.

Meanwhile, Google Home Mini is expected to be even more affordable than the $129 Google Home and could help the company rival Amazon’s offering that retails at $179.

Google betting big on AI

The tech giant seems to be betting big on artificial intelligence (AI) as all the products are expected to run Google Assistant. At its I/O 2017 event in May, the company announced support for the incorporation of the voice assistant in its devices, including iOS ones.

"We think these new capabilities will help power the next-generation on-device speech processing, visual search, augmented reality, and more," Android chief engineer Dave Burke said at the time.