Xbox and Google Home are not strange bed partners. The companies behind the products have previously worked together on Google Assistant support. It allows you to turn on your Xbox using a voice command. And no, you don’t need an expensive, unnecessary camera for that. Now the companies are going a step further.
We see the collaboration in the form of the Google Home remote control. That remote was already available for Android TV and Google TV devices. This allows you to operate your smart TV or media player without a physical remote control. Very handy when you’re just sitting down, and the remote control is too far away.
Google Home en Xbox
That remote control now also works for Xbox devices. With the digital remote, you can switch the Xbox on and off, go back a page, go home, and manage the volume. You will also find all kinds of buttons for media control, such as play and pause. Handy when you use your Xbox as a full-fledged media player.
It is also possible to completely switch off the sound (and switch it back on again) and to record a game clip. No, you can’t play with it, but who knows, that might come in the future. After all, touchscreen controls for Xbox games are available on smartphones when you game via Game Pass.
Locate Xbox In The App
You may still need to see your Xbox in the Google Home App. Then you have to open the app and pull down the screen to refresh things. You can also do this if your Xbox is already in the app because you added Google Assistant support in 2019. So worth a try.
Xbox also introduces some other features. For example, you can set or hide game art on your wallpaper. You can also set the Xbox only to update things in sleep mode when green energy is available (but that is not possible everywhere). Finally, there is now an energy-saving mode, which works slightly differently than the traditional sleep mode. The new variant is almost twenty times more economical.
