How To Force The Gemini Update On Google Home Speakers

If you’ve been staring at your Nest Mini like, “Any day now, Google,” there’s a new shortcut making the rounds that can kick off the Gemini upgrade process right now.

TL;DR

• There’s a simple deep link you can type into Chrome on your phone that opens the Google Home app directly into the Gemini setup flow.
• The switch is one-way once you upgrade your home to Gemini for Home.
• It doesn’t work for everyone, and some people report it only changes the voice (not the full Gemini experience).

What Happened

Droid Life spotted an easy “skip the line” method for people still waiting on the Gemini for Home rollout to hit their smart speakers and displays. The trick is basically a deep link that launches the Google Home app and drops you into the onboarding screens for Gemini.

In other words: instead of waiting for Google’s invite banner to appear, you poke the Home app in the ribs and ask it to start the upgrade flow.

The Important Details

The Shortcut

Type this into Chrome on your phone:

googlehome://assistant/voice/setup

If your device/account/home is eligible, Chrome should offer to open the Google Home app, and you’ll see the same setup screens you’d normally get when Google finally decides you’re worthy.

What Setup Looks Like

Expect the usual onboarding treadmill:

• A few “what’s new” screens about Gemini for Home
• Disclosures you have to acknowledge
• A prompt to upgrade (the point of no return)
• Voice selection
• Settings that decide how Gemini responds to guests vs. people in your household

The Biggest Gotcha

Once you upgrade your home to Gemini for Home, you can’t switch back to Google Assistant.

So if your household relies on a very specific Assistant behavior (old routines, a weird smart-home integration, a voice command you’ve trained into muscle memory), this is not a “try it for fun and bail later” situation.

It’s Not Guaranteed To Work

Multiple guides and user reports suggest the deep link doesn’t reliably flip everyone to the full Gemini experience.

Some people say it works perfectly. Others say it only changes the voice or the “vibe” while the backend still behaves like classic Assistant. The latter has been my experience thus far, but your mileage may vary.

Free vs. Paid Features

The basic Gemini for Home voice assistant experience is designed to work without a subscription for core stuff like:

• Smart home control
• Media playback/search
• Alarms/timers
• Lists, reminders, calendar-ish tasks

More advanced capabilities (like Gemini Live-style back-and-forth chat on supported devices) are tied to Google’s paid Home plans.

Why It Matters

Google’s smart speaker ecosystem has been stuck in a weird limbo for a while: Assistant is clearly on the way out, Gemini is the future, but the rollout has been slow and inconsistent.

This kind of shortcut gets attention because it taps into the exact frustration smart-home users have: “I don’t want to be ‘in a wave.’ I want my house to work.”

It also matters because the Gemini upgrade isn’t a minor UI refresh. It’s a platform swap. And platform swaps are where the annoying edge cases show up.

Tony’s Take

I love the idea of Gemini making voice control less brittle if it can actually handle more natural phrasing and fewer “say the magic words” moments, that’s a win.

But I hate that this is a one-way door.

If you’re running a bunch of routines, you’ve got non-Google smart-home gear in the mix, or you just don’t have the patience to troubleshoot why “turn on the kitchen lights” suddenly needs a different phrasing, I’d think twice before forcing the upgrade.

If you’re the type who enjoys poking new features with a stick (and your household will forgive you if something gets weird), go for it but treat it like a beta move, not a normal update.

What To Watch Next

• Whether Google opens the floodgates and makes early access basically “opt-in and done” instead of invite roulette
• How consistent Gemini for Home is across older speakers (and especially third-party Assistant hardware)
• Which legacy Assistant features quietly break or disappear once the switch flips