A year after launching the Google Home smart speaker with Google Assistant, Google is expanding the lineup with two new models… one small and cheap, the other big and… not cheap.
The Google Home Mini is a $49 speaker that’s designed as a cheaper alternative to the $129 Google Home.
The $399 Google Home Max is a bigger, louder speaker that’s more of a competitor to Bose or Sonos speakers (or the elephant in the room, Apple’s $349 HomePod).
Google Home Max features Google Assistant, like all other Google Home products. But it has higher quality audio components, support for multi-room audio, and a new feature called Smart Sound that automatically tailors the audio based on the situation in which it’s being used.
For example, audio is adjusted depending on the physical environment. Put the speaker in the corner of a room and it’ll shape the audio signals differently than if it’s in the middle of a kitchen counter.
You can also use the Google Home Max as a Bluetooth speaker, a Cast device, or connect it to other hardware via aux cables.
Google says Home Max is 20 times more powerful than the $129 Google Home speaker. It’s also more than 3x as expensive… but the price does include a 12-month subscription to Google’s YouTube Red service for music streaming (and ad-free videos).
