Google assistant: turn it on and off depending on the device you use

Disable Google Assistant

Mobile and tablet

We must go to the Google application on our smartphone or tablet and once inside click on the More option in the lower navigation menu.

Once done, we will go to Settings <Google Assistant and go to the Assistant tab. Once in it, when we scroll down we will see at the end a section called Devices with Assistant. We select the phone. Once inside, we deselect the Google Assistant.

Google devices

Those who want to disable their assistant in Google Home, Google Home Mini or other Google Nest devices, can also do so. We offer you two possibilities: totally or temporarily.

These methods are separate from the option to disable the active microphone on any of the devices, since doing so does not cancel your alarms or scheduled activities.

Temporarily disable

The method is very similar to that of the mobile phone, only we must go to the Google Home application. Once in the main menu, we choose the active device that we have. In our case it is the one found in “Bedroom”. Once selected, we press the Settings gear, and in Device Settings we go to Bedroom Speaker (in our case).

You may be interested in reading: Google Home vs Google Home Mini: differences.

In the settings panel that opens, the Digital Wellbeing option appears. Here we can establish an activity schedule for Google Home devices, periods of operation or suspension of all their schedules. By clicking on New schedule we can establish these schedules.

The configuration that we establish here is editable later or we can eliminate it completely if we want to.

Delete completely

The route is identical, only once we select the terminal and press Settings, we scroll to the end. At the bottom, we find the option Remove Device.

This option not only disables the device, but also removes it completely. In this assumption we are assuming that this is the desired option. If it is not what you are looking for, you can also mute it manually as previously indicated.

PC or laptop

If you are one of those adventurers who have installed the Google Assistant on your PC but have changed your mind, you are in luck. It all depends on the method you have used to do it:

Using an Android simulator Installing Python

In any of the two options, what the computer does is simulate the smartphone application of the Google Assistant, so you can follow the same steps as in the Mobile and Tablet section.

Additionally you can also uninstall the emulator or Python if its use was exclusively for Google Assistant. This will save disk space;)

Activate Google Assistant

You will notice that this second section can be a bit redundant after having read the first one since the steps are very similar, but here we are to make things clear.

We have a more extensive general article here: OK Google: how to activate it, list of commands and functions.

Mobile and Tablet

The steps are exactly the ones to disable:

We open the Google App. Click on More, in the lower menu. We mark Settings. We select Google Assistant. Assistant tab, scroll down to the Devices with Assistant section. Select Phone (or tablet). Select the Google Assistant option.

Google devices

Activating the Google Assistant is part of the initial installation process for Google devices, be they Google Home, Home Mini or Nest.

We recommend this detailed guide if you are in this situation: Set up Google Home Mini STEP by STEP.

What we must do is:

Download the Google Home application on our mobile Follow the installation steps to link our device. When you reach the step where you must say "OK Google", you will be activating the Google Assistant on your device.

PC or laptop

We have a specific article dedicated to this section that you can read here: ADD LINK TO ARTICLE PUBLISHED ON OCTOBER 20.

In order to activate Google Assistant on a computer, we must resort to third-party software. What happens is that the wizard is mainly intended as an application for devices, so that the options for PC are presented to us in alternatives of:

Download an android emulator for smartphone Install Python and configure it there.

As you can deduce, what we must do is emulate a “smartphone” environment for the Assistant application. Once we have access to the Play Store from our Android emulator, we can download the Google application and install it normally, associating it with our Google account.

Once these steps are done, the rest of the process is identical to activating the Google Assistant on mobile and tablet.

Conclusions to disable and enable Google Assistant

We understand that for some people the mechanisms to activate and deactivate Google Home are not very intuitive since the option is not found in the application menu as soon as you enter it, but you have to navigate a little through it. This occurs both in the Google app. like Google Home app. It may be implemented in the future, but in the meantime we hope this guide has been helpful to you.

We have more articles related to Google Assistant:

Something we find in common on all devices is that the interface of the Google Assistant is always very similar. Even the Google and Google Home applications follow the same type of structure, so once we get used to them they are easier to navigate. As always, if you have any questions or suggestions, do not hesitate to write to us in the comments. Greetings!