Google launches three new Nest cams and a redesigned Home app

Google is launching two new Nest Cams and a new Nest Doorbell, bringing 2K resolution to its lineup for the first time. The new wired Nest Cam Indoor 2K ($99.99), Nest Cam Outdoor 2K ($149.99 ), and wired Nest Doorbell 2K ($179.99) are the company’s first hardware designed for its AI-powered Gemini for Home platform, and they’re all available now.

While only the wired cameras are getting a hardware refresh this week, all of Google’s cameras, dating back to the first Nest Cam launched in 2015, will work with Gemini for Home.

The new cameras have the same design as their predecessors but come with the choice of new colors, including a berry red option for the indoor camera and a greeny-grey color (Hazel) for the outdoor model and doorbell. Google says the cameras are also built with a reformulated resin for better long-term UV resistance to help prevent yellowing.

All three cameras now support 2K HDR video, have a taller and wider field of view, and include a new sensor with a wider aperture lens for full-color low-light video. The 6x digital zoom has a new zoom-and-crop feature that automatically focuses in on whatever triggered an alert (a person, a pet) and can remain zoomed if you prefer. The outdoor camera’s field of view has increased from 130 to 152 degrees, while the doorbell now offers a 166-degree diagonal view (up from 145) with a new 1:1 aspect ratio.

Google is also doubling its free video clip storage, extending the 10-second motion-activated recording feature from three hours to six. For anything longer, you need to sign up for Google Home Premium — the new name for Nest Aware — starting at $10 per month.

Smarter camera intelligence

The higher resolution and wider field of view of the new cameras are designed to feed more data to Gemini, enabling some improved intelligence features, including AI-generated text descriptions.

Google’s Anish Kattukaran tells The Verge its cameras can now interpret and understand what’s happening in and around your home, rather than just alerting you. So, instead of an alert saying “animal detected in living room,” you’ll get a more descriptive one saying “dog jumps out of playpen.”

Text descriptions, which were first launched in Public Preview earlier this year, also power a new “Home Brief” feature in the Google Home App, which summarizes daily events in your activity feed – potentially helping to reduce the number of notifications your security cameras sends. These summaries are customizable, so you can prioritize pets or people over packages, for example.

Home Brief and AI descriptions require the top-tier Google Home Premium Advanced plan ($20 per month), which also includes 24/7 recording.

A redesigned Google Home app

Alongside the hardware, the Google Home app is getting a major overhaul. After years of feeling fragmented and incomplete, it now runs on a new architecture that, among other things, brings support for all Nest devices over from the Nest app. Kattukaran says the new app is more stable, faster, and better able to incorporate new features more quickly.

The new interface, which starts rolling out today, October 1st, has been streamlined, cutting five navigation tabs down to three: Home, Activity, and Automations. You can now swipe between views, and the automation editor finally supports one-time and conditional automations.

At the top of the app, a new “Ask Home” chatbot provides access to Gemini via voice or text. You can have it create automations with natural language, ask about home events (“Did my water leak sensor get tripped?”), or search video footage (“Were there any skunks in the driveway last night?).

A new AI-infused subscription plan

Google’s subscription service is also being revamped. The new Google Home Premium subscription replaces Nest Aware, keeping the same tiers and pricing while adding Gemini features:

Google Home Premium Standard ($10 monthly/$100 annually): Includes all Nest Aware features (30 days of video history, Familiar Faces, garage door and package detection, smoke and CO listening), plus Gemini Live on compatible smart speakers/displays, natural language automation creation in the Home app, alerts with zoomed-in previews, and whole-home history.

Google Home Premium Advanced ($20 monthly/$200 annually): Adds “Ask Home” for video search, AI notifications and descriptions, Home Brief, 60 days of event history, and 24/7 video history.

These features are also getting bundled into Google’s separate AI subscription plans, Google AI Pro and Google AI Ultra. The lower-end tier, Gemini AI Pro ($19.99), will get all the features from Home Premium Standard, and subscribers will be able to add Advanced for $10 a month. And if you happen to subscribe to the $250 per month Ultra tier… congrats, Home Premium is included at no extra cost.