Google Assistant keeps popping up? Here’s the fix

Year by year, Google Assistant is getting better and better, with a variety of nifty features added regularly. However, not all users fancy Assistant’s bugs. Some users claim that Google Assistant keeps popping up on their Android devices and most want to get rid of Assistant if possible.

If you want to deal with it or even disable the Assistant and reduce disturbance, we have a few ways to do it.

Table of contents:

1. Disable Google Assistant access on Headphones
2. Disable the Voice trigger for the Google Assistant
3. Turn off Google Assistant completely
4. Revoke permissions and voice access to Google Assistant

How do I prevent Google Assistant from popping up?

Let’s start by addressing possible issues with the Google app itself (which is the base of Google Assistant). Here are some things you should try to tackle issues with the Google app that, arguably, might lead to issues with the Assistant itself:

• Reboot your device.
• Clear cache and data from the Google app. Open Settings > Apps > All apps or App manager > Google > Storage > Manage storage and clear cache and data there.
• Leave the Beta program. Open Play Store and search for Google. Scroll down and tap “Leave” under the Beta program section.
• Uninstall Google updates.
• After that, disable the Google Assistant voice trigger, and Google Assistant gesture, or disable the feature completely if Google Assistant keeps popping up.

Solution 1 – Disable Google Assistant access on Headphones

The majority of reported cases suggest that the problem occurs mostly on headphones. Users are listening to music, podcasts, or something else and the Google Assistant just pops up with that annoying sound, stopping the playback.

This usually happens when they press and hold the Play/Pause button on the headphones. Which, by default, should trigger Google Assistant. Of course, it depends on what kind of headphones you use, but those are, in general, global settings.

Now, the first and simplest solution is to prevent Google Assistant triggers on both wired and wireless headphones. Here’s what you need to do:

1.  Open Settings.
2. Choose Google.
3. Select Settings for Google apps and then Search, Assistant, & Voice.
4. Tap on Voice and disable Bluetooth audio recording, Allow Bluetooth requests with device locked, and Allow wired headset requests with device locked.
5. Restart your device and look for improvements.

Solution 2 – Disable the Voice trigger for the Google Assistant

If the problem is global and Google Assistant is popping up without you summoning it, the next thing we can do is disable the Voice trigger. That way, it won’t be summoned by voice (or at least it shouldn’t).

Follow these instructions to disable Voice match > Hey Google on your device:

1. Navigate again to Settings > Google > Settings for Google Apps > Search, Assistant, & Voice.
2. Open Google Assistant.
3. Select Hey Google & Voice Match.
4. Disable Hey Google.

This will prevent Hey Google or OK Google voice prompts from triggering the Assistant.

Solution 3 – Turn off Google Assistant completely

In case even that doesn’t prevent nasty intrusive pop-ups, you can completely disable the Assistant on your handset. Re-enabling it is simple if you want it back but, considering how much trouble is causing to some users, that’s not highly probable.

Follow these steps to disable Google Assistant entirely:

1. Navigate again to Settings > Google > Settings for Google Apps > Search, Assistant, & Voice.
2. Open Google Assistant.
3. Select General.
4. Disable Google Assistant.

Solution 4 – Revoke permissions and voice access to Google Assistant

Finally, if you are still, after all these previous steps, unable to abolish Google Assistant from your device, make sure to revoke all permissions from Google and disable Voice Access in Default apps settings.

Here’s what you need to do:

1. Navigate to Settings > Apps > App manager or All apps > Google.
2. Revoke Microphone permission for Google App under Permissions.
3. Now, get back to the list of all apps and tap on the 3-dots menu.
4. Select Default apps.
5. Scroll to the bottom and open the Voice assistant or Digital assistant app.
6. Select None instead of Google.
7. After you’ve done that, close everything and open System Settings again.
8. Search for Gestures and disable the Google Assistant trigger gesture.
9. Restart your device and look for improvements.

With that said, we can conclude this article. Thank you for reading, if you want to discuss this article further, but also find even more similar content, make sure to follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

Editor’s note: This article was initially published in April 2021. We made sure to revamp it for freshness and accuracy.