voice search

You can replace Siri with Google's Voice Search, but there's a catch

I'll catch some flak for this, but I still like Siri.

In fact, I find it extremely useful for things like setting reminders and sending text messages hands-free. It's not perfect, but neither is it as useless as many people seem to think.

That said, Google's newly updated Voice Search is all kinds of awesome. It's blazing-fast, amazingly accurate, and in many ways just plain smarter than Siri. Use it a few times and you'll immediately start wishing you could ditch Siri for it -- or, at the very least, make it as push-button accessible.… Read more

Search your Android phone with Google's free Voice Search

Voice search is such a useful smartphone capability that yours may already have it (ours did). Maybe you already have Google's Voice Search, too. This free app integrates seamlessly with Google Search; just look for the microphone icon. Voice Search lets you search your phone or device, the Internet, and nearby locations just by speaking (clearly) into your phone. Even if you're not the best public speaker, Voice Search is smart enough to offer a range of suggestions, and it can learn to understand you, too. If your Android device doesn't have a built-in voice search app, … Read more

Google offers up secret sauce on new voice search

How voice search technology listens to and spits out information is a complex endeavor, but Google has attempted to explain what mechanisms make its voice search app work in a new research paper it posted earlier today.

Basically, it boils down to data, and lots of it.

According to Google, more data improves all Web services. This may seem obvious, but for better speech recognition, it doesn't only mean a sheer amount of data but also how that data is organized. Google's voice search technology mainly uses data from anonymized queries on Google.com to get the information … Read more

Google challenges Apple's Siri

While CNET's New York office works to get power back after the storm, we're bringing you the Update show from our San Francisco office. Tuesday's top tech stories include:

- Superstorm Sandy has knocked out power, Internet and phone service across the east coast. Nearly 8 million people were without power as of Tuesday.

- Google introduced new gadgets: The Nexus 10 will go head-to-head with the iPad. It has a 10-inch screen with higher resolution than the iPad. (But these screens are so good, the difference may be imperceptible to most of us.) And Google released … Read more

Google's Siri competitor for iOS arrives

Nearly three months after its snazzy demo, Google's enhanced voice search for iOS is here.

The service, which mimics some of the functionality found in Google's search technology built into Android as part of Jelly Bean, aims to keep Siri on her toes.

The software (iTunes) provides contextual, spoken results for voice queries and serves up Web searches for everything else. In some brief testing this morning, the answers came back markedly quicker than Apple's own offering, even showing you voice transcriptions as queries were spoken -- something Siri does not do until users are done talking. … Read more

New Google Voice Search, Siri are closely matched (hands-on)

This article updates the original hands-on comparison posted on July 2, 2012, to include changes to iOS 6. I also compare Siri on iOS 6 to Samsung's S Voice (found in the Samsung Galaxy S3 flagship phone.

Back in June, Google's Android 4.1 Jelly Bean managed to bring Android's voice actions to the forefront in a meaningful way. Mostly, by dressing up the voice search interface like Apple's Siri, and making voice search available from any screen. (Samsung's attempt for select Android phone, S Voice, falls behind .)

Luckily for Google, Voice Actions was fairly accurate in our tests. Thanks to an iOS 6 update that brings even more capabilities, Siri can do more than Google Voice Actions. That's a definite benefit for iPhone 4S and iPhone 5 users. However, Google Voice Actions' accuracy remains on point.

The two of us, Brian and Jessica, each tested commands on the iPhone 4S or iPhone 5 and on the Samsung Galaxy Nexus updated with Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. Brian tested the phones in New York and Jessica tested in San Francisco. Here's what we found.… Read more

Google+ Local app hits iPhone with voice search, Zagat ratings

The Google Places iOS app has a new name and new features.

Redubbed Google+ Local as of yesterday, the travel app now offers iOS users several handy, new options.

First up is voice search. You can speak the name or description of what you're seeking.

For example, saying the phrase "Mexican restaurants" displays a list of places serving Mexican cuisine in my local area. Uttering the words "Dunkin' Donuts" shows me a list of all Dunkin' Donut establishments nearby. And speaking the name of a local restaurant calls up its specific listing. Simply tap the … Read more

Google gathers language samples for better voice search (video)

Using voice search can be a snap but what goes into developing that kind of technology?

SmartPlanet recently visited Google's voice search team to find out. The company's technology currently covers 26 languages, including Zulu, Spanish, and Hindi. To search in 26 languages, the team needs 250,000 samples of local speech. Linne Ha travels the world helping collect them.

This video originally appeared on SmartPlanet with the headline "At Google, gathering language samples for better voice search."

How to use voice commands on your Android phone

When Apple announced the voice recognition app, Siri, every Android owner was thinking the same thing: we've been doing that for years. Free apps that are available in the Market right now use voice commands to complete everyday tasks like text messaging, sending e-mails, getting directions, and finding reviews.

So while Siri (you know that's "butt" in Japanese, right?) makes its way to the iPhone 4S, grab these free apps and start telling your Android phone what to do right now.

Dragon Go brings voice-powered search to iOS

Back in late 2009, software developer Nuance made waves with Dragon Dictation, a killer free app that translates your voice into text.

For Nuance's next trick, Dragon Go turns your voice into a search engine. Just tap the Record button, say what you're looking for, and presto: the app runs a search.

Wait a minute, doesn't the Google app do exactly the same thing? It does, but with decidedly Google-style results: Web, Images, Places, etc.

Dragon Go incorporates a wide range of mobile sites. Thus, a search for singer Brendan Benson produces results from not only Google, … Read more