[Updated] Google aware of issue with 'turn off all the lights' command not working for some Home/Nest users, fix may take a few days

New updates are being added at the bottom of this story…….

Original story (published on August 31, 2021) follows:

Google Home and Nest devices have a troubled history when it comes to voice commands. Unrecognized commands and errors are extremely common and there doesn’t seem to be any respite even after years.

There are also complaints about the quality of voice recognition that has deteriorated over time and even cases of Google allegedly changing its command syntax.

A quick scroll through the Google Home subreddit (r/googlehome) will lead you to multiple reports from both Home and Nest users about the many issues they have to put up with.

We have been keeping track of such problems here at PW and you will definitely come across an issue that you face and a solution for it, if any, on our dedicated section for the same.

As if the existing set of issues weren’t enough, a new one has popped up now. In this one, the Google Home “Hey Google, turn off all the lights” command is not working properly anymore and fails to trigger the usual actions.

The command “turn off the lights” would turn off the lights in the room I’m in with a bong sound. The command “turn off all the lights” used to turn off all the lights in every room with a confirmation “turning off 36 lights”. Since a few days ago the “turn off all the lights” command would only turn off the room I’m in.
Source

Instead, the “all lights” command now only works for lights in the room that the user is in at the time, for both the turn off and turn on commands.

Normally, the ‘turn off all the lights’ command should obviously turn off lights for all the connected lights in the house, just as the command implies.

Thankfully, a Google employee on Reddit has now acknowledged the issue where the ‘turn off all the lights’ command is not working on Google Home and has said the following about it:

Turns out that the change is deliberate and Google is now working on rolling it back after taking note of all the negative feedback. The rollback will take a few days though so just hang on for now.

That said, you will also be pleased to know that Google is working on a Home web client for new Nest Battery Cam and Nest Doorbell Battery to finally enable desktop support. More on that here.

03:46 pm (IST): An individual on Reddit recently confirmed the problem was fixed for them and the command to turn on/off lights works as usual. In case you’re still facing the issue, drop a comment below to let us know.

Yeah, just had confirmation from the Twitter admin that this has been resolved and can confirm that on testing my lights, normal functionality has been restored (Source)

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