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Google announces big changes for Assistant at MWC 2018
June 28, 2025
Mobile World Congress 2018wrapped up its first official day today, andGooglewasted no time in making some major announcements forGoogle Assistant. Last week, we told you Assistantwould be available in over 30 languagesby the end of 2018, and seven of those new languages are now available. The addition of Hindi, Thai, Indonesian, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, and Dutch brings the current total number of supported languages to fifteen.
Assistant can also nowbetter integrate with third-party apps. Using Assistant to check the weather or set a timer is great, but working with other apps can be a little clunky. Google knows this and developed the new Android Link feature to make things smoother.
Using Android Link, developers can create Actions that connect Assistant to information or tasks in their own apps. Google showed off the feature by asking Assistant about a parking reservation withSpothero. Assistant opened the app on the phone and brought up all the info for the upcoming reservation. Android Link will roll out to developer accounts in the coming weeks.
Another issue developers face is getting more information from users to complete a specific task. For example, when making anUberreservation with voice commands, there’s a lot of information needed: starting point, destination, and selection of Uber ride. Rather than forcing all app developers to make their own code for these tasks, Google created askForPlace, an Assistant function that handles location-based functions for developers, so no new code is needed. The image below gives you an idea of how this new function will work:
Google has also built a “memory” function into Assistant to keep note of all the information that passes through relating to other apps. In the example of the Uber ride above, the next time the user says, “Blue Bottle Coffee near home,” Assistant will use the info from the last session to complete the task. Once again, developers won’t have to do anything here; Assistant will take this task off their plates.
2018 is going to be an exciting year for Google Assistant. The service just gets better and better.
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