The upswing in voice searches during the past few years clearly shows hands-free communication is the way of the future. Not that the situation changed dramatically, looking back. There were always aspirations to use your vocal chords as an instrument of command (lest you are a singer, in which case you are doing that already). This year marked 15 years since Google first launched Google Voice Search or Voice Action, as it was known back in the day. What changed? It’s just that only recently technology advanced to the point that such idea could fully become a reality. The increasing ability to accurately respond to voice queries effectively turned around the way that we search. Nowadays, we use our smartphones, speakers and other devices to talk to and issue commands. This just demonstrates how crucial voice search and natural language processing have become for future developments.
For this post, we’ll focus on the best voice search apps and what they bring to the table. All the apps are free to download unless stated otherwise. Let’s start.
Google Voice Search
If there was ever any doubt as to what is the best voice search app, it’s gone now. There shouldn’t have been any suspicions in the first place as this is the one that defined the genre. While it’s no longer called Google Voice Search, the app is now a part of the whole Google package. That means that besides voice queries, you can browse videos, images, news and much more. Basically, you can find anything on the web and explore it. US users are the ones really set as they have an exclusive option of having a personalized feed and receiving notifications about a variety of interests like weather, news, sports and so on.
Naturally, the biggest advantage of any Google product or service is its extensive database. Coupled with added extra features like feeds and regular updates on what matters to you, you get the best there is. Not to be Internet-dependant, the app also allows offline voice actions. That means you can command it to turn off wi-fi and play some music, for instance. Google also does a great job of updating it regularly, with the last update just a few days ago.
Dragon Go Voice Search
Dragon Go in the brainchild of Nuance Communications, one of the pioneers of speech recognition. It allows you to search a number of services like Wikipedia, Yelp, Pandora, and so on. However, Dragon Go is more than just a basic search tool as it has some concierge functions. The app delivers complementary results in a carousel form that enables users to
compare information. For instance, if you want to purchase a movie ticket, Dragon Go shows the most relevant sites for your request, as well as social media commentary on the subject.
The voice recognition is top notch, which is not a surprise, considering who developed it. What is a surprise is there is no offline mode as the app requires network connectivity (WiFi or 3G/EDGE). Many compare it to Siri, although Nuance has it’s very own Dragon Mobile Assistant. We find it works best as a voice search app with complementary features as a bonus.
Now, on to the more exclusive voice search apps.
Voice Search UX
The name kinda gives this one away. Voice Search UX (or Voice Search, according to Google Play) is your standard voice search app for fast queries. The app has several integrations, including Bing and Yahoo search engines, as well as a range of Google’s services. The way it works is that you issue a command and choose the right result. UX Apps, the developer of the app, went the safe path and used Google’s voice search as the technology behind its offering. That certainly guarantees a consistent level of accuracy for those already familiar with voice searches. With Voice Search UX, you can launch different apps, call your contacts and search for website or services. On top of that, the app works in several different languages and is fully customizable.
Voice Search Launcher
If you are looking for an app to do your voice bidding, you might as well choose Voice Search Launcher. Admittedly, there is nothing special here – you get to search for apps, contacts, and websites for the content you want. You click the app’s mic button, say what you want and it displays a number of results. You pick the best match and that’s it. This doesn’t deter from the fact that the app has a quite accurate voice recognition, making it easy to use. There isn’t much in terms of options, apart from automatically prioritizing your favorite searches and remembering your recent queries. You can also customize the widget by adding different apps for faster access.
Honorable mention Voice Search Apps
While this post focused solely on the apps that specifically deal with voice search as their primary function, we cannot deny that digital personal assistants are also viable candidates for the job. The likes of Google Assistant, Siri, Alexa, Cortana and others handle voice searching with ease. It’s a mash of voice search and assistance with the assistance being the more prominent part, in our mind. It’s a close, co-dependant relationship so it comes down to a matter of perspective. Do you make a difference between the two features or not? This time, we wanted to focus solely on voice search apps as much as possible so we made that distinction. We talk about digital agents all the time, it can’t hurt to take a break from them, right?
Conclusion
The truth is, there isn’t much choice when it comes to voice search apps. Because of the way the technology advances, voice activation today is seen as a part of a whole. The rise of artificial intelligence assistants has effectively cornered the market, leaving little to others. In fact, many of the personal assistants started as voice search apps. Their previous incarnations are now one of the cornerstones of the AI assistance movement. To consumers, this all makes sense – they get a whole package with a variety of additional features. As technology grows, so do our appetites. Calling your friends through voice command is one thing, but ordering a pizza or booking a flight is a whole nother ordeal.
Still, that’s not to say that there isn’t a market for voice search apps. Not everyone likes to hand over the amount of personal information to digital assistants that need it for optimal performance. Another way to look at it would be the power of smartphone devices. Some of us are perfectly content with last year’s model or older devices with older OS versions. In that term, voice search apps are easy on the resources, for the most part, and they “accept” older variants of operating systems. Granted, it’s a small market, but it’s there. To each his own.