Hands-on: Gemini on Google TV is faster, better, and more futuristic [Video]

8 hours ago 4

Google TV is preparing for some big updates in 2025, with Gemini in the pipeline as well as new presence sensing in certain TVs which really opens the door to a whole new way to use your TV.

Since its inception, voice controls have been a key part of Android TV. At the beginning, that was mainly for input in order to avoid 10,001 button pushes just to type out the name of a movie. Then, Google Assistant arrived to add support for asking questions, finding content, and even controlling smart home devices.

But, as Gemini has become the focus, Google Assistant has continued to degrade, and that’s been felt on Google TV and Android TV in recent years.

Google announced at CES 2025 that it would bringing Gemini to Google TV this year, and we were able to get a sneak peek at the functionality at the annual tech show. Google showed off four new parts of Google TV, starting with presence sensing. Coming to select TVs with compatible hardware (including one unnamed model from TCL), Google TV will be able to know when someone is in the room and can turn the TV off from a sleep state, then show a Nest Hub-like “on-screen hub” that shows the weather, calendar appointments, Nest camera feeds, and more.

In action, this works shockingly well. As we approached the TV, the screen lit up to Google TV’s screensaver, only to jump to the “hub” as we walked closer. I like the idea of this, as I often do like having my TV showing photos or a screensaver while I’m in the room, and by knowing that, the TV can ensure it’s turned off when I’m not using it at all. The “hub,” though, I’m not too sure about. The idea is clear, as it presents a nice central place to look at information, but I don’t necessarily want that in my living room. This would make sense for a TV in a bedroom or a home office, though. I’ll be curious to see how, if at all, Google implements this feature for TVs without the presence sensor.

After the TV is on and aware that you’re nearby, the door then opens to hands-free voice controls, as Google is putting further emphasis on “Hey Google” commands for TVs with far-field microphones, a feature that’s remarkably common nowadays from brands such as Hisense and TCL.

With the arrival of Gemini, this functionality is getting supercharged. Not only does it process much faster than before, but the end result is also better. Personally, I’ve never been big on using voice commands with my Google TV setups, but that’s primarily because Assistant is slow, and occasionally just doesn’t work. It’s a drag, especially for a feature that once set Google’s platform apart from the rest. Thankfully, Gemini goes a long way to fix that, making voice commands faster both in the voice recognition and getting the end results.

Google showed examples of using Gemini to find movie recommendations similar to another using deeper context, such as age groups, or more general queries about travel that still finds YouTube videos on the topic.

None of this functionality is reinventing the wheel, and it’s not even “replacing” Assistant either, as you’ll still see Assistant’s UI pop up to finish some tasks. Despite that, it all feels brand new and like a drastic upgrade in functionality that I’m looking forward to using in day to day life.

Note: This video is just to show the UI and interactions, and has no audio.

Google TV is also adding “News Brief,” a new feature that uses AI to summarize trending news topics while also pulling in videos from reputable news sources. Google explained that the feature refreshes multiple times per day, and it seems like a handy way to catch up on trending topics without opening a streaming app.

Google says that Gemini and these other new features will be arriving “later this year on select Google TV devices,” and teases that this is just the beginning of what Gemini models could bring to the platform.