Chinese Search Giant Baidu Unveils Voice Assistant App

At the moment each of the major smartphone operating systems has their own voice assistant. Apple has Siri, Google has Google Now, and Microsoft has Cortana. The advantages to these voice assistant features is that they’re all baked into the operating system itself, meaning that it can cover a variety of apps and functions easily.

However it seems that Chinese search giant Baidu plans on competing with these voice assistant apps. The company has recently announced their own voice assistant in the form of Duer. Basically the idea is similar to the other voice assistant features. It can help users order food, control smart devices at home, hail a cab, order housekeeping services, and more.

This reminds us of SoundHound who recently debuted their own voice assistant app called Hound. Interestingly enough there have been some tests conducted in the past which found that Hound, despite it not being integrated into the operating system, has actually performed much better than its native competition.

That being said, it seems unlikely that Baidu’s Duer will be making its way stateside anytime soon. However if Google plans on making more headway into the Chinese market, it would seem that Duer could potentially be a service that they might have to compete against.

[Image credit – ChinaFotoPress/ChinaFotoPress via Getty Images]

Tyler Lee
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: Apps, baidu