Verizon has introduced its first smart display, the uninspiringly named Verizon Smart Display, that aims to challenge rival offerings in a rather unique and service-oriented fashion. Now, the smart display segment has no dearth of capable rivals such as the Nest Hub from Google, Amazon’s Echo Show range, Facebook’s Portal, and the Lenovo Smart Display — each with its own set of advantages and limitations.
The 10-1-inch Echo Show 3 by Amazon features a rotating display that follows users as they move, ensuring that they’re always in the frame during a video call. The Nest Hub Max is the best smart display when it comes to fully utilizing the Google Assistant's potential in tandem with Google services. With features like Face Match, quick gestures, and auto-framing, it lays a strong claim to the best smart display crown. However, Verizon appears to be taking an altogether different approach here.
Announced during the Alexa Live presentation, the Verizon Smart Display borrows its boxy design elements from the Facebook portal, but that’s where the similarities end. Talking about the internal hardware, there’s not much to write home about. Buyers get an 8-inch display with a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels, 4GB of RAM, and 16GB onboard storage. There's also a physical camera shutter for those worried about privacy. Notably, the Verizon smart display also has a low-power 4G LTE modem, but as CNET reports, it won’t offer any home internet service.
The Verizon Smart Display comes with its own virtual assistant that has been built on top of Alexa’s underlying technology, and will respond to both "Hi Verizon" and “Alexa” wake words. However, it appears that the Verizon assistant will divert some of the smart-ish queries to Alexa. More importantly, the device appears to be primarily targeted at Verizon customers who will be using it for setting up or on-device troubleshooting, avoiding having to call up customer service.
The goal, as highlighted in the official introduction video, is to eliminate the need for sending over technical experts or having them join live on a video call to resolve issues. However, it will offer some smart features such as summoning Alexa for checking the billing status, streaming music from multiple platforms, including Amazon Music (of course), and video calling. Verizon says that its smart display will be rolled out soon as part of a beta program for a small bunch of Fios customers, while a wider release for customers with Verizon’s 5G Home Internet and LTE Home Internet services is planned for 2022.
Big Red is yet to reveal the price of its smart display, which makes it a curiosity in a sea of some very capable and feature-rich options. Even if Verizon prices its smart display in the ballpark of $200, it will still be going up against the likes of Next Hub Max, Amazon Echo Show 10 (Gen 3), Lenovo's ThinkSmart View, Facebook Portal+, and even bundles that include an Amazon Echo Show 8 or the 7-inch Nest Hub coupled with other smart home devices. Notably, all the aforementioned products fall in the $200-250 price bracket. The Verizon Smart Display certainly doesn’t look like a product that can compete with Google or Amazon’s offerings on either the variety of features or the price-to-value front, leading to the question of whether anyone actually needs one?
Source: Alexa Developers/YouTube, CNET
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