Using Google Voice Commands on Your Android Phone

by Lori Cunningham

Editor’s Note:  Congratulations to Terry Brown, Jill Lear, Mark Osborne, Janet Frewing, and Melissa Shirley on winning their own copies of Wondershare’s DVD Slideshow Builder Deluxe!

In doing research for the BlueAnt Ribbon we reviewed last week, I became more interested in Google Voice Commands.  Google Voice Action Commands is for Android what Siri is for the iPhone/iPad.  It allows you to speak what you want to do instead of type it.  Sometimes you need a reason to get yourself out of your comfort zone.  I have traditionally hand-pecked my search items in the Google search box on my Android phone.  I’ve seen the microphone symbol in the search box, but figured it wouldn’t work well. To my surprise, using the Google microphone on my Android smartphone works very well.  It’s my new friendly companion.  I looked up the different voice commands from Google that can be used on the  Android phone and tested them out.  Below you will see screenshots of what I saw once I used a Google voice commands.

                                I said, “Anaheim Angels.”                                            I said “Pictures of Oreo Cheesecake.”                                                                      I said” Thai Food in Glendale.”

Hey, this is very cool, what great information.  What a plethora of information on the Anaheim Angels.  If they were playing right now, I’d see their scores here too.  My son has a fixation on Oreo Cheesecake, probably because he gave up desserts for Lent.  So he enjoys googling Oreo Cheesecake whenever he can.  I know that when I’m in a city I don’t know, I never seem to know the best resource to find a restaurant. Do I use Foursquare?  Yelp?  Simply saying “Thai Food in Glendale,”  gave me numerous choices and an easy way to show on the map how to get there!

OK, let’s try some more!

I asked “Get Directions to Tam O Shanter,” an Irish restaurant & clicked on Get directions and received this map.  Looks like the restaurant is 50 miles away.

Saying “Life of Pi movie times” shows the local theaters & times.         What’s the “time in China?” told me that it’s too early there.            Need to  call a business, just say something like “call American Airlines.”

Need to do some quick math, I said “432+1560+2+14+13+219 equals,” boy was that fast!                                               Just curious, “how many centimeters are in a yard?” yielded this answer.

  Forget the dictionary, here I said “define ridiculous.”                                                                                             Translation works like a charm, here I said, “translate I will be back soon to Spanish,” and viola!

More Actions

And there are so many other actions you can do like say…..

• “Weather San Antonio”
• “American Airlines #5024” to get your flight status
• “Open Gmail” or any other app for that matter
• “What’s that Song” when a song is playing in the background
• “Scan a barcode” while holding the barcode to your smartphone camera
• “Send email,”  “to [contact name],” “subject [speak the subject title]”, “message [speak your message text]”
• “Note to self,” see our article on the  BlueAnt Ribbon to see how well this works
• “Set alarm” and say “6:30am” or “15 minutes from now”
• “Listen to “[insert name of song in your playlist]”

For more voice commands and examples see Voice Action Commands and Use Voice Actions in the Google Support pages.  Note, all of the commands I used worked great with Android 4.0.  If you have a previous version, you may find that not all of the commands will work. So, sometime this week, grab your phone and check out the Google Voice Commands for yourself.    Just repeat some of the commands I gave in this article to help you see how easy it is.  Not sure how to access Google Voice Commands on your Android phone?  Look for

the “g” in your Apps or download Google search from Google Play.  On my Galaxy S3, I have a Google search box with a microphone on my home screen.  If you don’t have this Google search box your phone, you can search for it under Widgets and add it.  You will also see the microphone anytime you use your smartphone keyboard.

Let us know how you’re using Google Voice Commands or what success you’ve seen if using it for the first time.  There is really a wealth of information and efficiency at our fingertips – you just need to know how to access it.  Have fun!