What you need to know
- Google is rolling out three new features for Nest camera users in the Google Home app, which will each be first available in Public Preview.
- The update expands support for the first-generation Nest Cam Outdoor in the Google Home app.
- Users will also be able to create custom clips from existing events, and find out if their garage door is open with AI.
Google is adding a few new features to existing Nest cameras as part of its ongoing effort to make them work better with Google Home, the company announced Wednesday. Expanded support for the first-generation Nest Cam Outdoor, custom clip creation, and garage door detection will all be coming to the Google Home app.
The changes are now available to users enrolled in Public Preview, which gives a glimpse at upcoming Google Home features before a worldwide public rollout. Like other forms of beta testing, the idea is that Public Preview members will spot and report bugs before a feature's general release.
While the first-generation Nest Cam Outdoor is currently supported in the Google Home app, it is fairly limited compared to newer Nest cameras. With the new update, Google is bringing two new views to the Home app for this camera: event list view and timeline view.
In the image above, the first screenshot shows what a first-gen Nest Cam Outdoor video feed looked like in the Google Home app. There's just a video feed without many of the newer features that have become staples of the Nest ecosystem. By comparison, the next two screenshots show the new event list and timeline views, respectively. This should make it much easier for users to go back and find video footage.
When it's time to download some footage, users can now create custom clips out of existing events. Nest cameras automatically record "events" when they detect movement, a person, or other conditions. But when these events are detected, the cameras typically record longer than is actually necessary.
Instead of downloading the entire clip, users can now pick a starting point within an event and download a specific part of it. For users that have a Nest Aware Plus subscription — and the 24/7 video recording that comes with it — Google makes it possible to download a custom clip from any moment in the continuous history.
Google's last feature is perhaps the smallest but perhaps the most useful. Using AI image detection and on-device processing, Google can detect when your garage door has been left open. A compatible camera can send a notification to a user's phone each time a garage door is opened. It can also send a notification once a garage door has been left open for more than five minutes.
Garage door detection will become available to users in the U.S. and Canada starting this week, as long as they are enrolled in Public Preview and pay for a Nest Aware subscription. It works with the second-generation, wired Nest Cam Indoor or a Nest Cam Battery that has been wired directly to a power source.
As an aside, Google says that holiday themes will return to Nest doorbells beginning Dec. 1. Google also added that it is currently working on bringing event history and clip downloads to the web version of Google Home.
