Google TV Streamer review: The new gold standard

The Chromecast is one of Google’s longest-running and most-loved hardware products, having launched all the way back in 2013. Over a decade, it became one of the simplest and best media streamers you could get, capped off with the well-received Chromecast with Google TV (and later an HD-only model). I say “capped off” because, earlier this year, the company unceremoniously announced the end of the Chromecast line. “But don’t worry,” Google figuratively said to the haters, “We’ve got an even better streaming device now.” That better device is the brand new Google TV Streamer.

The Google TV Streamer is very different from a Chromecast. It’s larger, more powerful, and comes with a slew of features the company never could have provided in a tiny dongle. It’s also a lot more expensive. The question then becomes: was the death of the Chromecast worth it? In my opinion, the answer is a resounding “yes.”

The first thing you’ll notice about the Google TV Streamer is that it’s big — not as chunky as an Apple TV 4K, but far bigger than any Chromecast, that’s for sure. Google made it larger to infuse it with more power and, incidentally, get it out from behind the TV. Since the beginning, Chromecasts have been designed to be hidden away, but the Google TV Streamer is ready to take center stage on your TV console. More on the why behind that in a later section.

Being larger also allows for more ports. The Google TV Streamer has a USB-C port that’s exclusively for power, an Ethernet port, and an HDMI 2.1 port. Of the cables you’ll be connecting to these ports, only the USB-C cable and a wall adapter come in the box. Unfortunately, you’ll need to provide your own Ethernet and HDMI cables.

If you decide to forego Ethernet, you can always connect the streamer to your network through Wi-Fi. However, I’d recommend using Ethernet if at all possible, as it will drastically improve your streaming experience, especially if you make a habit out of streaming 4K content.

There’s one more thing on the back of the streamer: a tiny button. This serves three functions. With a long press of between two to five seconds, you can initiate the Find My Remote service. It will tell your remote to start chirping so you can more easily locate it. You can also ask your smart home for help (“Hey Google, find my remote”) or start the chirping from the Google Home app. In other words, if you lose your remote with this device, that’s really on you: Google has done all it can. Second, if you hold down the button a bit longer, it puts it into pairing mode, allowing you to connect a gaming controller, another remote, or any other supported Bluetooth devices. The third function of the button is to factory reset the device. Be careful not to hold the button down for too long if you just want to find your remote.

The included remote control has also been redesigned, and I love it. It’s slightly larger, for one, which is a welcome change considering how minuscule the remote was for the original Chromecast with Google TV. It still has a big d-pad-style navigation and selection system at the top, but it has had a facelift when it comes to buttons. Several have been rearranged, the Google Assistant button has been replaced with a generic microphone button, and the input selection button has been ditched. Meanwhile, the volume buttons have been moved from the side to the front, which is a very nice change (I hated those side volume buttons). There’s also a brand new button: the “star” button at the lower right, which is designed to be customizable.

Thankfully, you can customize the new star button to replicate what the input switcher button did on the older Chromecasts. However, you can also use it to quickly launch one of your favorite streaming apps (although the remote has dedicated YouTube and Netflix buttons, so you’re covered there) or even launch the new Google Home app. More on Google Home in a bit.

Finally, the Google TV Streamer comes in two colors: Porcelain (off-white) and Hazel (gray-green). Porcelain is available everywhere, but the Hazel colorway — pictured throughout this article — is exclusive to the Google Store.

The outside of the Google TV Streamer is very different from a Chromecast, but the inside is also different. Google hasn’t publicly confirmed as much, but our research shows that it has a MediaTek MT8696 SoC inside. According to Google’s estimates, this allows for 22% faster CPU performance than the Amlogic S905X3 SoC inside the 2020 Chromecast with Google TV.

Additionally, Google has doubled the RAM in this new streamer, bringing it up to 4GB. In my experience, this new SoC and the extra RAM make a huge difference. As I was navigating around the Google TV interface (which is a skin that lives on top of Android TV), I saw zero lag. Apps opened quickly and smoothly, and launching content happened nearly instantaneously. I don’t know if it was 22% faster, but it’s definitely faster and smoother than the Chromecast with Google TV.

Because it’s an Android TV box, you can access the Google Play Store. This is where you’ll get all your streaming apps, but it’s also how you can buy or rent movies and TV shows, install Android TV games, or even download a new launcher to revamp the user experience. I haven’t had a chance to try it out yet, but I’m really excited to see what the new Plex-focused Dispatch launcher is all about, as I’m a huge Plex nerd.

Speaking of downloading, with older Chromecasts, you needed to be careful about installing too much stuff because the measly 8GB of storage filled up fast. Google addressed this problem with the new streamer by quadrupuling storage, jumping to 32GB. I still wish there were a microSD card slot (or another USB-C port to attach external storage), but increasing storage by 4x is still very nice.

Finally, despite the outside and inside being different, this is still a Chromecast at heart. Like a Chromecast, it supports casting media to the TV from your smartphone, tablet, or laptop. In other words, it might not have “Chromecast” in the name, but it will do everything you want from a Chromecast.

One of the standout new features of the Google TV Streamer is the Google Home app. This isn’t an “app” in the traditional sense (there’s no launcher icon to be found) but rather a pared-down experience of the Google Home app that you can use on your TV. Think of it somewhere between a widget and an app.

Using the aforementioned customizable shortcut button (or by holding down the home button and selecting the Google Home tile if you decide to keep the star button as an input switcher, which I heartily recommend), you can launch the Home experience, which appears as a series of tiles in a flyout sidebar. Here, you can control your smart lights, climate control, or even check out what’s going on with your security cameras right on your TV. Granted, most smart home users would use voice commands for most of the features here, but my partner hates talking to my Google speakers. She really enjoyed being able to turn off the lights using the remote and not need to say “Hey Google” to anything.

One of the coolest features of the Google Home experience on this streamer, though, is integration with the various iterations of the Google Nest Doorbell. When someone comes ringing at your door, a notification appears over your content that allows you to see a live feed of the doorbell’s camera. Unfortunately, you can’t interact with the feed — you can’t talk to the person through the remote or even issue a canned response like you can on a smartphone — but being able to see who’s at the door right on the big screen is undeniably convenient. Check out the video at the top of this article for a demonstration of this feature.

Google Home access isn’t the only new smart home trick the Google TV Streamer has in its bag. Google has also infused it with Matter and Thread powers. Inside the streamer is a Thread border router, allowing it to act as a smart home hub for compatible devices. In other words, if you have a smart light bulb that requires you to buy a branded hub — but it also has Matter support — you don’t need to buy that hub. Instead, the light bulb itself can connect directly to the Google TV Streamer, which will act as the hub. This cuts down on the number of devices you need to buy, saves you space, and frees up a wall outlet that would be otherwise taken by that superfluous hub.

Of course, Matter support is still slowly rolling out, so a lot of people reading this might not have any need for a Thread border router. However, at least some people reading this haven’t started a smart home yet. If that’s you, this is a great place to start.

Regardless, this is one of the significant reasons behind Google’s push to get this streamer away from the back of the TV. To be an effective Thread border router, it would do well to have an open view of your home. Additionally, the streaming box being exposed helps with remote connectivity and latency, so it’s just better for it to be on your console and not collecting dust at the back of your television.

As an aside, although Google really, really wants you to keep this streamer out from behind the TV, there’s no reason you can’t keep it back there. I hid mine behind my LG C1 OLED for a bit to test it out, and I didn’t notice any issues. Granted, I wouldn’t do that if it were the center of my Thread smart home, but if you don’t care about that, tucking it away is just fine.

Like the Chromecast with Google TV before it, the Google TV Streamer can turn your television into a giant digital photo frame. By linking your Google Photos account to the streamer, you can see your albums on the big screen whenever your device has been inactive for a time. While this is nice, it’s also a bit cringe: seeing my photos blown up to 65 inches really shows off how not great they are.

If you don’t want to see your weak photography skills blown up to huge proportions, you can select to show a batch of professional photos instead. However, what Google hopes you want to do the most is use generative AI to create your own screensaver images.

That’s right, it’s 2024, and AI is in everything, even the Google TV Streamer. Using it to create AI screensavers is very similar to how you would do so with Gemini on the web. You simply give it a text prompt, and it makes something for you based on that prompt. It all happens off-device and takes about 10 seconds to render, but it works as advertised. I had it make an image of Noel Gallagher as a cat, and it did so, if a bit creepily (it’s the eyes). I don’t see much use for this feature (I would much rather see the real photos from pro photographers as my screensaver), but if you want to use it, it’s there.

The big downer here is that none of these images move. Google doesn’t add a parallax effect or even subtly zoom in on photos to add some cinematic quality to them. Nope, they just appear as static images, with one cutting directly to the next — Google didn’t even bother to add transition effects. Hopefully, the company will tweak this a bit in the future, as it seems like this would be relatively easy to add in later.

Elsewhere, AI powers another feature on the Google TV Streamer: AI overviews. When you pull up popular content on the home screen, you’ll see generative AI summaries of that content. This will give you a quick synopsis of what to expect from the show or film as well as summaries of critical reviews and audience scores. There’s also a rating summary to warn you if the content has nudity, violence, drug use, or other things you might not want your kids to see.

Like the generative AI screensaver images, I don’t have much use for this. Most of the content I watch has been suggested to me by friends and family, so I’m not really going to pay any attention to this information. I also don’t have kids, so I’m fine with all the R-rated content being freely available. Still, it’s nice to know these summaries are there if I ever need them. They are quite limited at the moment, though: they’re only available in English and only work on the top 2,000 movies and shows available across all streaming platforms. This will get better, though, I am certain.

Finally, Google Assistant is baked into the Google TV Streamer, even though the Assistant button has been removed. By holding down the microphone button on the remote, you can launch apps, play music, search for movies, and even ask general questions such as, “What’s the weather right now?” During my testing, I found Assistant to be fast, and the microphone understood everything I said perfectly. Of course, it’s only a matter of time before Google replaces Assistant with Gemini here. For now, though, you’ll be chatting with Assistant on the Google TV Streamer.

After playing with the Google TV Streamer, I am convinced that this is worth seeing the end of the Chromecast. While I appreciate how tiny and simple a Chromecast is, it can’t compete with the big boys, and the Google TV Streamer can. It has all the hardware necessary to do pretty much anything the average person would want to do with a streaming device while tossing in a few uniquely Google features.

Of course, this is Android Authority, a place where serious tech nerds hang out. I can already hear most of them saying to themselves, “Why would anyone get this over an NVIDIA Shield TV?” It’s true — the NVIDIA Shield TV ($149 at Amazon) is a more powerful and more versatile product, to say nothing of the NVIDIA Shield TV Pro ($199 at Amazon). However, the Google TV Streamer is much cheaper, with a list price of just $99 — 33% cheaper than the Shield TV and 50% cheaper than the Shield TV Pro. When you consider this, the new Google streamer offers quite a lot for comparatively little.

Really, I don’t think Google is going after folks using or thinking about buying a Shield or even an Apple TV 4K. Instead, this is aimed at people who are using an ancient Amazon Fire TV Stick, Roku, or, even worse, the built-in operating system that comes with their TV. Those folks — and there are a lot of them — would likely be OK spending $100 if they knew they’d get something fast, reliable, feature-rich, and from a trusted brand.

When you take this into account, the Google TV Streamer is a solid product. In fact, I’d argue it’s now the gold standard for Android TV streamers. If you want all the bells and whistles, go for a Shield, and if you want something cheaper but still effective, go for the years-old Chromecast with Google TV ($49.98 at Amazon). But if you want the best Android TV box you can get without tipping into overkill territory, this is the streamer to buy.