Google is adding three new Gemini-powered voices to the Nest Mini and Nest Audio smart speakers, bringing the number of Gemini-powered voices on those speakers to a respectable ten.

This comes as part of Google's continued push to merge its new Gemini AI with the existing Google Assistant on its Nest speakers, and likely brings us one step closer to an eventual retirement of the venerable Assistant altogether.

New voices are available in the preview build

Experimental, and possibly only available in the US

The Nest Audio speaker with its lights active, sitting on a small pile of books

The three new voices join the seven added in December of 2024, and like the seven beforehand, the new three are all named after plants. Here are the three new voices and how Google describes them:

Yarrow: Warm, deeper voice
Croton: Smooth, deeper voice
Pilea: Bright, higher voice

The other seven, "improved Assistant voices", as Google terms it, are the following:

Aloe: Calm, mid-range voice
Oxalis: Bright, mid-range voice
Fern: Bright, higher voice
Verbena: Calm, deeper voice
Ivy: British accent, mid-range voice
Jade: Engaging, mid-range voice
Eucalyptus: Australian Accent, higher voice

A wall-mounted Nest Mini.

These new voices aren't available to everyone though, as not only will you need those specific Nest Home devices, you'll also need to be enrolled in the Google Home Public Preview program — and even then, you'll need to make sure the “Experimental AI features” is enabled too. But even then, you might not be able to access them, as multiple comments on the original article have posited that the feature is US-only — though even some US-based users aren't able to access it. It's likely Google is rolling this out to a specific group of users, and the only way to know if you have it is to check.

If you want to know if you have the new voices, you'll need to make sure “Experimental AI features” is enabled by tapping the Beaker icon in the Google Home app. Then, head to your Google Home Settings, select Google Assistant, then Assistant voice & sounds.

If you, like me, don't have access to the new voices, well, you can at least enjoy the video uploaded by 9to5 Google.

I'm personally quite fond of Eucalyptus's Australian tones, but Croton's smooth voice is also quite soothing. I would happily listen to Croton read me a bedtime story.

On the whole, the Gemini rollout to Google's smart speakers has been a positive one, but it's highly likely the Assistant monikor will be retired when the rollout is completed, as happened on Google TV. That will be a sad farewell, but frankly, "Assistant" as a name does feel outdated in 2025.