Make your Google Home portable with this snap-on attachment – CNET

With the Ninety7 Loft, you can take your Google Home with you as you move from room to room.

The makers of the Vaux Portable Speaker Base for the Amazon Echo Dot launched two new products Wednesday: The Loft provides up to eight hours of battery charge for your Google Home, and the Dox is another attachment for the Dot, but this one works with the second-generation Dot and provides 10 hours of battery.

Both the $130 Google Home and the $50 Amazon Echo Dot are always-listening smart speakers. Say their respective wake words, and they’ll act as music streamers, smart home controllers or personal assistants. Both need to be plugged in, however, so you typically need multiple units if you want to talk to your digital assistant from anywhere in a large home. That’s the problem that Ninety7’s attachments attempt to solve.

We liked the Vaux when we tested it this spring. We found it easy to fit the Dot in place and it gave the Dot a boost in sound quality. Hopefully, both the Loft and Dox will follow suit. The Dox looks more compact than the Vaux, and the Vaux only offered six hours of battery.

The Loft cleverly takes advantage of Google Home’s detachable bases. Snap off your Google Home base, and the metallic Loft snaps in its place.

Both the Loft and the Dox can be preordered today at a discount from the company’s site. At retail, the Loft will cost $50 (which converts to roughly £35 and AU$60) and the Dox will be $40 (£30/AU$50). Ninety7 expects to start shipping both models in October.