Chromecast with Google TV: Everything we know about Google's upcoming Android TV dongle - Android Police

Google's long-awaited Android TV-powered "Chromecast with Google TV" is nearly here.

Since then, Chromecast and Google TV branding have leaked together with the new name, and we've seen renders and even real photos showing off the dongle, its bundled Chromecast Voice Remote, and even the product packaging in plenty of detail:.

When it comes to hardware, the Chromecast with Google TV is a small, not quite oval puck with a USB Type-C port for power and a dangling cable for HDMI output — pretty familiar design in general if you've used one of the later model Chromecasts.

The bundled Chromecast Voice Remote, in addition to its own weird branded name, includes a directional navigation pad, back button, Assistant button, home button, mute button, app buttons branded for YouTube and Netflix, a TV power button, a button to change TV inputs, a microphone, an LED to indicate when it's activated, and volume controls.

Separately from the hardware itself, we even have photos and video of the Chromecast with Google TV in action.

In short: It's Android TV, running Android 10 (not the latest Android 11), and it should support all the same apps and services you would expect, but sporting a slightly redesigned interface that leaked earlier this year.

Other changes spotted earlier in the year included smart display-like Nest alert overlays for folks with the smart home hardware to take advantage of it, plus a new Assistant interface, though we haven't seen any of that in action yet, either.

Detailed specs for the upcoming Android TV dongle have been divined from XDA's leaked software images.

So far, leaks haven't tested which HDR standards the dongle will support, but the hardware itself can do HDR10, HLG, and Dolby Vision

The chipset also supports HDMI 2.1's Auto Low Latency Mode, which could let the Chromecast with Google TV tell compatible TVs to switch over into game mode for specific activities — probably hinting at official support for Google's cloud game streaming service Stadia, though Google could use it for something else, or it may ignore that hardware support entirely