Google Gemini Live hits iPhone and it makes Siri look very outdated

Further to reports suggesting an imminent launch earlier this week, Google Gemini Live is now officially available within a new standalone Gemini app for iPhone.

While some Gemini AI tools have been available within the main Google app for iPhone for a while now, the standalone app will make them easier to access, as well as integrating perhaps the most eye-popping feature yet.

Gemini Live is a personal assistant that has moved into the generative AI era with a truly conversational feel that enables back and forth with an AI that has a large selection of “emotionally expressive” voices.

The tool enables you to ask whatever you want of the assistant and even interrupt it mid-flow to change tack. It actually feels quite revolutionary compared to the first generation of disruptive voice assistants like Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant.

There’s an impressive range of natural-sounding voices and Capella, a female voice with a British accent, is a dead ringer for my American wife’s British alter ego who goes by the name of “Rachel”. It’s pretty scary actually.

During some brief play with the new Gemini app, I noticed the app works quickly and Gemini Live even appears as one of the Live Activity widgets on the lock screen and in the Dynamic Island.

That means I was able to chat with Gemini Live even after exiting the app, although I wasn’t able to start a conversation without being in the app. The ability to use the regular text-based Gemini chatbot, either by typing, talking or importing images, is also available.

Upon the announcement, Google said: “Gemini Live is a mobile conversational experience that lets you have free-flowing conversations with Gemini.

“Want to brainstorm potential jobs that are well-suited to your skillset or degree? Go Live with Gemini and ask about them. You can even interrupt mid-response to dive deeper on a particular point, or pause a conversation and come back to it later. It’s like having a sidekick in your pocket who you can chat with about new ideas or practice with for an important conversation.”

Considering Apple is quite far behind on its efforts to bring this sort of technology to Siri, the launch of the Gemini app, including Gemini Live on iOS, gives Google a few bragging rights.

The new version of Siri with contextual “on-screen awareness” as well as more conversational capabilities is expected in a forthcoming rollout of Apple Intelligent features, but not until the spring and, perhaps as late as iOS 18.4.

I didn’t want to like this but…

Man, my first experience with Gemini Live on the iPhone was eye-opening to say the least. The conversational assistant doesn’t skip a beat. The conversation ticks along quickly, it feels natural, the assistant reacts to pivots quickly, and doesn’t blink at being interrupted. Most importantly, it offered genuinely useful information and, in my short time playing around with the Gemini app for iPhone, I found that information to be accurate. It appears to be a remarkable breakthrough and Apple has some catching-up to do when it relaunches its version of Siri with Apple Intelligence.

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