At the start of the year, the Nest Hub and Nest Hub Max started playing a new sound following a successful Casting connection, and that updated chime is now appearing on Google Home and Nest speakers.
This new Casting sound is rolling out with Cast firmware version 1.54 to speakers enrolled in the Preview Program — current stable is 1.50. The previous confirmatory chime/beep had been in place for several years, if not the start of Chromecast.
The new tone is softer and very much fits the friendly Nest visual and auditory design language. It’s much less deep, and thus not as jarring or startling for others in the room that might not be aware that a Cast session is about to begin.
We’ve encountered it on a Nest Mini and Google Home Max today. You can compare the two versions below:
