Google's Human-Sounding Phone Bot Comes to the Pixel

“Uhm,” said the female voice. Then the bot signed off with a cheery “Ok, great, thanks.” Duplex had started the conversation by announcing “I’m Google’s automated booking service so I’ll record the call,” but it was barely distinguishable from a person. Google announced today that Duplex will be made available on the company’s Pixel smartphones before the end of the year, in New York, Atlanta, Phoenix, and the San Francisco Bay Area. It will be a feature of Google Assistant, the company’s rival to Apple's Siri; for now, it will only call restaurants without online booking systems, which are already supported by the assistant. Nick Fox, the executive who leads product and design for Google search and the company’s assistant, says those interjections are necessary to make Duplex calls shorter and smoother.