Google Nest Wifi - Whats New

Last month , Google announced the successor to the Google Wifi now named the Nest Wifi .

Now the Google wifi had been one of the top selling mesh Wi Fi routers out there now for the past couple of years .

So any change that Google was going to make to this product , we knew it would be significant .

Now , I've had the Nest wifi router as well as the Nest wifi point .

Now for the past couple of days and in this video , I'm going to give you the rundown on what's new with the nest wifi .

How it compares to the Google Wifi , my first impressions of the device and some recommendations and suggestions .

If you're stuck between getting one over the other , let's dive in .

So what's new with the nest wifi first , let's talk design .

The design of both the nest wifi router and the Nest wifi point are definitely a design departure from the Hockey Puck design .

The Google Wifi sports , the Nest wifi has a matte finish allowing the ambient light pickup of its surface to be a little bit more subtle .

And overall , I think these devices blend into their environment better though the primary nest wifi point that connects to the modem is a bit large , larger than the Google wifi puck .

The nest wifi also comes in more colors than the Google Wifi and you can order any color you want on the Google store .

Another design departure for the nest wifi is the abandonment of the U BC power cord that the Google Wifi uses the nest wifi actually uses the same barrel jack power cord that you can find with the nest mini one gripe I have with these newer Google power jacks is they take up much more room on a power strip than the old Google wifi ones did which are much more compact .

Another area where the nest wifi differs from Google Wifi is that with Google wifi , each puck router , all of them have two Ethernet ports with the nest wifi .

This is not always true .

You have your main wifi routers that have the jacks and then the nest wifi points which act as nest minis .

The points do not have Ethernet ports .

Google does sell packs of the nest wifi system that just use the nest wifi routers as the mesh points .

And it skips the Google assistant enabled wifi points altogether .

The nest wifi point with the Google assistant integration is probably one of the most unique things about the nest wifi system .

And that's because in order for a mesh wi-fi system to work , the wifi points actually need to be in prominent places in your home , they need to be on tables on uh you know , just out in the open in prominent places , they should not be behind furniture or tucked away in a cabinet .

So by adding the Google assistant to the nest wifi point , Google just added another level of functionality to this device .

So it is no longer just a wifi point , but it also acts as a nest mini speaker which is going to make it much more likely that people will put these in prominent places in their home and will reap the benefits of having a better performing mesh Wi Fi system .

You can use the touch controls on top of the wifi point to control the speaker just as you would with the nest mini .

However , instead of the four glowing dots at the top of the speaker , like with the nest mini , the nest wifi point has a glowing ring at the bottom that reflects off whatever surface you place the point on and it looks pretty good .

It will also change colors based on what you're doing for things like phone calls or muting the speaker just like with the mini .

The sound quality of the nest wifi point is pretty good too though , we'll continue to test how well it sounds .

Compared to a nest mini Google also added some nice features for the wifi point in its settings .

Like if you keep the nest wifi point muted , you can turn off the light that's emitted from the bottom .

So you are not constantly seeing the mute light on .

You also have full control over the brightness of the light on the nest wifi router as well .

Just like you did with the Google wifi router .

Also at the time of this recording with the nest wifi , you can actually run internet speed tests through any of your Google assistant devices , including devices like the nest hub max and the nest mini .

Now , in terms of performance , the nest wifi does have improvements over the Google wifi system .

For example , Google says that if you have a nest wifi router and a nest wifi point , those two devices together will cover the same area that it would take three Google wifi points to cover the wifi router has newer wifi standards .

While the nest wifi point seems to have the same supported wifi standard as the Google wifi router just by looking at the text specs .

However , the Nest wifi does have updated security with the latest W P A three standard .

Now in my limited testing so far , the range , it actually does seem to be better than with the Google wifi system I had before I completely replaced my Google wifi points with Nest wifi points .

And the reason I actually have two Google wifi points is I got the additional one to pump out enough signal across the street to my garage so I could control it with my smartphone and while the signal I had at the garage was , it wasn't bad , but it wasn't great .

It was like borderline .

We signal but it worked well enough where the garage got , you know , good enough signal to test .

I was able to download updates from the internet over wifi .

Well , when I replaced the Google wifi points with nest wifi , now the signal I get out to the garage is like borderline .

excellent , like it's almost full bars .

The nest wifi router will cover 2200 square feet and the nest wifi point will cover 1600 square feet .

Where with the Google Wifi points , those only cover up to 1500 100 square feet .

Setting up the nest wifi is a little different than setting up the Google Wifi .

You now have to use the Google Home app instead of the Google Wifi app for set up .

It still works just as easily as it did in the Google Wifi app .

Because the Nest wifi router and points are compatible with the Google Wifi routers during the set up , you'll have the option to add your Nest Wifi devices to an existing Google Wi network .

Now , some of the more advanced features in the Google Wifi app have not been ported over to the Google Home app just yet .

So you will still need the Google Wifi app if you need those advanced features .

However , do note at the time of this recording and this isn't going to apply to everyone out there .

But if you're like me and you have a Google wifi system and you're like , yeah , I want more Google stuff .

Let me just replace everything with Nest wifi points .

Well , there's a slight problem with doing that if you want to keep the same network that you have with your Google wifi points .

Unfortunately , I have not been able to figure out how to switch the primary Google wifi point , which within the Google wifi app , your primary point is what is considered .

It's , it's the point that just connects to the mode , right ?

The internet is coming through the internet cable to the router .

Google wifi is like , ok , great .

That is your primary point .

Well , if you want to replace that point with the nest wifi router and do it so that the nest wifi router just carries on all of the characteristics of your existing network .

There's no actual way to do that when you just try to add the nest wifi router to your existing Google wifi set up .

It's just going to consider it an additional wifi point and not a primary point .

Unfortunately , the only way I've been able to figure out how to replace all of my Google wifi points with nest wifi points is by just setting up my nest wifi points as a new network .

Now , if you're looking for a new mesh wi-fi system for your house and are trying to decide between the Google wifi and the nest wifi .

My advice would be to go with the nest wifi if you want better coverage and like the appeal of the wifi points being Google assistant speakers .

Now , if you're more cost conscious and you see a good deal on the Google wifi , then I'd say go for it .

Now , if you want the best performing Google made mesh wi-fi system available today , Google actually sells a two pack of the nest wifi routers .

So there's no nest wifi point in that two pack , it's just two of the routers .

So if you don't care about having a nest wifi point with the Google assistant , I would say go for the two pack and I'll make sure we'll link a bunch of these different packs and stuff in the video description below in case you're interested .

Well , that's it for our first year impressions of the nest wifi .

We'll be doing a deeper dive into the nest wifi in our six months later , review of the device next year .

Now , if you want to stay up to date on all the latest with Google products and see other Google product videos like this one .

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Well , for six months later , I'm Josh Teter .

Thanks for watching