Because Gemini Live with native audio was still in development, OTTO first tested an interim approach: extending the existing text assistant with speech-to-text and text-to-speech layers. Functionally, the setup worked. Customers could speak to the assistant, and the assistant could respond. But in remote user tests, the experience did not create the excitement the team was looking for. It felt less like a real conversation and more like a voice-operated text chatbot, with noticeable pauses between turns. Customers responded by using short commands—“Trousers”—rather than sharing the richer context that makes advisory shopping valuable. The test made one thing clear: voice control alone would not be enough. To create deeper engagement and better advice, OTTO needed a native audio experience built for real conversation.

The voice assistant entered open beta in early May 2026. Production data is only days old at the time of writing, but early customer behavior already validates the central design bet. In voice mode, customers tell the assistant more than they would ever type. In one test session, a customer describes a broken lamp in passing—"a wire is sticking out"—and the model surfaces the right replacement product. Voice draws out context, text never captures.

The further horizon is more ambitious. OTTO is exploring agentic capabilities for routine purchases (replacement orders, recurring needs) and multimodal extensions such as virtually placing furniture in a customer's own room—never on autopilot, always with the customer in control. For a company that has navigated every wave of retail change since the printed catalog, conversation is simply the next interface.