Following the acquisition, Fitbit hardware will now have Google’s ubiquitous Assistant. It is seen as a good sign for Google’s not-so-exciting Wear OS.
The code implementation on Fitbit Versa 2 is similar to that of Amazon Alexa. With this, users can make use of their microphones to talk to their watch to control smart home devices to ask for information like the weather.
According to a report by the Wired UK, Fitbit had earlier sought help from Google about making the Assistant available on the Fitbit Versa 2. However, Google was “less willing” than Amazon to make it happen.
Now, new strings in the application suggest that Google Assistant is soon going to make its way to Fitbit devices.
res/layout/a_google_assistant_on_boarding.xml
res/layout/f_google_assistant_landing.xml
res/layout/f_google_assistant_teaser.xml
Although it is still not clear whether the Google Assistant will be made available on the Fitbit Versa 2 or an upcoming Fitbit device, the application suggests that Google Assistant won’t be replacing Amazon’s Alexa. Users can choose to summon whichever assistant they want to.
Google Assistant might not be different from Alexa in terms of functionality as there’s nothing much you can do with a voice assistant on a watch without a speaker. However, support for Google Assistant will bring support for smart home devices that were not necessarily supported by Alexa.
Since this piece of information comes from the code of the application, there’s no information on when we can expect this new integration to be announced.