The Google Assistant is coming to more devices. In a blog post on Wednesday, Google announced that its eponymous personal assistant will hit tablets and Android devices running 5.0 Lollipop and newer "in the coming weeks."

It'll roll out to Android tablet users in U.S. who've set their device language to English, specifically tablets running Android 6.0 Marshmallow, 7.0 Nougat, and 8.0 Oreo. And it'll simultaneously hit 5.0 Lollipop smartphone users with the language set to English in the U.S., U.K., India, Australia, Canada, and Singapore, as well as Spanish in the U.S., Mexico, and Spain.

It's also rolling out to devices in Italy, Japan, Germany, Brazil, and Korea.

Once you get the Google Assistant, creating a shortcut to it's as easy as opting in -- you'll see an Assistant app icon in your device's app drawer. The integration isn't seamless as it is on newer versions of Android, where it's baked into the launcher -- you'll have to launch the Google Assistant manually every time you want to use it. But it offers the same breadth of features as other incarnations, including smart home device controls, weather reports, directions, restaurant recommendations, reminders, and more.

Tablets mark the Google Assistant's sixth platform debut -- it's already on Android Wear 2.0 smartwatches, Android and iOS smartphones, Google Home, Chromebooks, Android TV, and Android tablets -- and it dramatically expands its availability. According to Google, more than 26 percent of all Android devices run some version of Android 5.0 Lollipop, and just over 30 percent run Android 6.0 Marshmallow.


Source: Google