Tell me if I choose Alexa or Google Home pls?

[ohnoquickhide]

Hi,
I am long term ill with incurable cancer. Ongoing chemotherapy. single parent. Just had to take the plunge and move my bedroom downstairs. I have trouble getting up and down stairs.

Kids are still sleeping upstairs, in their own bedrooms. 12 and 13 years old.

I know that we are going to have issues like one of them can't get out of bed in the mornings and I usually have to wake him up.

Also both of them would read all night long or even smuggle a iPad in there and be on it all night if I wasn't sleeping up there. They're good kids but this would happen sometimes!

I don't want them to have mobile phones or any tech in their rooms overnight as they're of an age where it will be abused.

Was trying to work out if I can therefore somehow use technology to communicate between floors. Does anyone know what would be best?

I want:

To have it in about five rooms

To be able to just tell Alexa or google to tell the kids upstairs that dinner is ready (rather than yelling as I often feel unwell and I can't actually go upstairs either)

To tell DS1 that I know he is reading at 11pm and that he shouldn't be....without going up there to find out or speak to him

Tell DS2 to get out of bed...and to tell the system to eg "make an alarm off in his room at 715 and 720"

For all of us to be able to play music. I have a discounted amazon prime account and would prefer to play music off there rather than subscribe to something else

To be able to watch you tube videos etc on one or two of the screens

To be able to turn lights off upstairs that the kids have left on yet again without having to drag myself up there (and it is drag rather than walk up stairs).

Can anyone help? Idiots guide needed please !

I have both and I find Alexa to be alot better. It seems to have more features and listens more.

I have four Alexa's. 2 dots, a small echo show and a larger echo show. I am the least techie person ever. I bloody love them. The large echo is wonderful. You can watch Amazon prime on it.
I know that you can make 'announcements' on them to communicate. I recommend that you read the reviews on Amazon to see what it can do.
My dad had the Google one bought for him. From what he's said it doesn't sound anywhere near as good as Alexa and he wishes that they'd bought that instead.

Sorry about your illness. It's a tough time.

My DH is also now living in bed so we've tried out a lot of this stuff. We have both Google and Amazon voice interfaces.

Both of those will do most of those things. Google Home's voice recognition is better, so if you have a strong regional accent or trouble speaking clearly (teeth problems, whispery voice, dry mouth from meds etc) than you will prefer that. Both of them are better than they used to be, but Google is distinctly better at both speaking and listening. One of DH's carers cannot get the Alexa to understand what she is saying at all and she doesn't have THAT strong of a Tyke.

Google Home will play Google Music but not stream Amazon Prime music; it's possible to download and then play APM on Google Home but it's a massive faff so I don't advise it. Google Home Hub will come with it all set up to play Youtube, but Alexa Show can do this too, just not by voice command. If the music is the biggest issue, go with the Alexa. It works fine. It's not AS good as Google home but it does all of the things you want plus streams from Amazon Prime. And also streams from Audible. The reason we still have both products is the audiobook streaming.

Google Home's broadcast/intercom feature is better; we found the Alexa often becomes very echoey. But for short exchanges like dinner is ready, Alexa works totally fine.

Lights are easy to set up on both - so long as you have wifi lights like LIFX or Philips Hue. They just screw in and work pretty well.

Oh also you can set up Downtime on Google, so you can limit the kids access at night etc:

support.google.com/googlenest/answer/9141219

Oh, I'd forgotten about audible. I've been spending a lot of time in bed for the past few months due to pain and it's been a godsend.

I have a chronic health condition ( though not life limiting) I like Alexa. My daughter is on the top floor of our town house so I use her for communicating.
I have a my side lamps on smart plugs so I don't to be reaching down or behind furniture to switch them on and off. I know it sounds really silly, but all that bending and stretching really causes me issues. Yes I could have the main light on, but the bright lights in the evening is not so great for me.
I can send my daughter messages etc. I have a small echo show and find I wake better as the alarm with that gradually lightens the room before the alarm goes off this could be better for your poor walker.
She keeps shopping lists for me, I can listen to my audio book and I have amazon music so can just choose a genre to listen too. With BBC skills I can listen to BBC content and just have the BBC news headlines whenever I like.
I have show in my bedroom, dot in DD's room, dot in the kitchen and dot in the sitting room. We are about to move house and will have a family room and I have a dot for there too.