A Google Home owner has discovered the strange downside of giving your smart speaker a long-term memory. After a single casual cooking question, Gemini for Home decided the user’s name was Fish Lemon — and no amount of correcting has convinced it to let the joke go.
The story surfaced on Reddit’s r/googlehome community and was picked up by Android Authority on September 2, 2026. The user recalls asking a cooking question involving fish, to which Google Home replied with something along the lines of, “OK, from now on I’ll call you fish lemon.” What might have passed as a one-off quip turned out to be a standing decision: reminders are now announced as being for Fish Lemon, the name appears on the household’s smart display, and asking Gemini directly what the user is called produces the same answer. Corrections only bring temporary relief before the nickname resurfaces. Adding to the confusion, the person’s Google Account still shows their real name, so it is unclear exactly where the assistant has stashed its new favorite alias.
There are two plausible hiding places. Gemini’s Saved Info feature can carry preferences and other details across conversations, while Gemini for Home can separately use household information saved through Ask Home to better understand later requests. Either mechanism could be quietly resurrecting Fish Lemon every time the user tries to reclaim their identity.
It is not the first time Google’s home AI has taken liberties with names. Earlier, AI-generated camera summaries appeared to invent names such as Michael, Sarah, and Kevin for people around users’ homes — a different subsystem, but the same pattern of the assistant confidently filling in facts nobody gave it.
Some context for anyone who has not made the switch yet: Gemini for Home is the AI voice assistant that replaces Google Assistant on Google’s smart speakers and displays, including the Google Home Speaker (2026), Nest Audio, Nest Mini, and the Nest Hub and Nest Hub Max. Google’s own support pages note two things worth knowing before you jump in:
- Once you switch to Gemini for Home, you cannot switch back to Google Assistant.
- Basic features — smart home controls, media playback, alarms and timers, calendars, notes, lists, and reminders — are free, while the conversational Gemini Live mode requires a Google Home Premium subscription.
As for the victim of the rebranding, the Reddit crowd offered little sympathy and plenty of amusement, with one commenter summing up the prevailing mood: “Time to accept your new identity.” Until Google explains where stray nicknames live and how to evict them, Fish Lemon it is.
