Alphabet Inc.\u2019s Google announced a slew of upcoming features for its Android 17 operating system, showcasing its progress in artificial intelligence weeks before Apple Inc. is set to announce major upgrades to its own iOS platform and AI offerings.<\/p>\n
The Android updates, announced Tuesday in addition to a new \u201cGooglebook\u201d laptop platform, include advanced capabilities for the company\u2019s Gemini AI assistant, redesigned emoji and improvements that should appease creators who frequently post videos to Meta Platforms Inc.\u2019s Instagram. <\/p>\n
Google said the new features will roll out in waves. Several of them will debut on Samsung Electronics Co.\u2019s next foldable phones and Google\u2019s own Pixel 11 series, both coming this summer. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a great concern about Al for Al\u2019s sake, and we want to be very purposeful,\u201d Sameer Samat, who oversees the Android ecosystem, said in an interview.<\/p>\n
The company is detailing its plans just weeks before Apple\u2019s Worldwide Developers Conference, where the iPhone maker is expected to unveil an overhauled, more conversational Siri assistant powered by Gemini AI models. But Google, which is holding its own developer event next week, wants to sell consumers on the idea that Android provides an AI experience several years ahead of whatever Apple ultimately introduces. <\/p>\n
\u201cSome companies are still working on their first iteration of what that chatbot or assistant voice assistant should really be,\u201d said Samat. \u201cI\u2019m sure that will be great when they get to it.\u201d <\/p>\n
But many shoppers remain suspicious of AI. \u201cI think the consumer is trying to figure out how they should feel about AI, and I want to make sure that everything we do in our experiences in Android is done with a purpose,\u201d Samat said. \u201cThis is a fundamental shift in how we interact with technology. And the conclusion is that every aspect of the operating system needs to change.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gemini Intelligence<\/p>\n
Google is taking at least one cue from Apple: It\u2019s rebranding the new suite of consumer-facing Gemini features on premium smartphones as Gemini Intelligence, similar to Apple Intelligence.<\/p>\n
One major new Android capability is Rambler, a voice dictation feature that ignores filler words and aims to home in on what\u2019s important. Audio is only used for transcription purposes and isn\u2019t saved or stored anywhere. Rambler can also switch between different languages in a single message.<\/p>\n
Android 17 will also expand the ways in which Gemini can browse the web or control apps on a user\u2019s behalf. After testing automated multistep tasks on Samsung and Pixel phones earlier this year with a small number of rideshare and food delivery apps, Google will let people use this functionality in a much broader range of scenarios. For example, if you have a grocery list in a notes app, Gemini can build a shopping cart with those items for a delivery order. Users can intervene and stop an automation or take over at any time.<\/p>\n
Another feature, Create A Widget, lets users set up home screen widgets by telling Gemini what they want through natural language.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor years, we\u2019ve been micromanaging our computers, breaking down our goals into endless clicks or taps,\u201d Samat said. \u201cAnd I think the new interface with AI can change that. You can articulate the goal and the computer should figure out the execution.\u201d<\/p>\n
A Key Fix for Creators<\/p>\n
One longstanding user complaint about Android has been that video recordings might look fantastic when viewed on the phone that captured them, but once they\u2019re shared to Instagram, they can lose detail and the overall quality falls short of clips taken with an iPhone. The difference isn\u2019t always stark, but it\u2019s enough for many creators to favor Apple\u2019s hardware.<\/p>\n
But during a media briefing ahead of Tuesday\u2019s announcement, Google said it has worked closely with Meta to resolve the issue and claimed that external side-by-side tests confirm that videos captured and uploaded from high-end Android devices now score the same or better than an iPhone.<\/p>\n
Android 17 also introduces a new CapCut-inspired feature called Screen Reactions, which records a video of both the user (with the selfie camera) and whatever is on their screen at the same time. This format has proven popular on social media, but often requires using a green screen and a third-party editing app for the best end result. Now, Google is building it right into Android. <\/p>\n
The new creator-centric features will arrive first on Pixel devices.<\/p>\n
Other New FeaturesEmoji are getting a makeover, with a new batch of over 4,000 icons that have greater depth and realism. These, too, will make their debut on the Pixel line.A new tool, called Pause Point, is meant to help cut down on doomscrolling. It lets the user label specific apps as distracting. When you open that app, Android will make suggestions like doing a 10-second breathing exercise or switching to an audiobook app. You can also set an app timer limit or spend a few seconds swiping through your photos as a mental reset. More digital wellbeing features are coming later this year.Google is making it easier for Android users to share with iPhone owners over AirDrop. Even on phones that don\u2019t have the recent Quick Share workaround, you\u2019ll now be able to generate a QR code to instantly share files, images and videos with iOS devices via the cloud.In the coming weeks, third-party apps including WhatsApp will be able to share cross-platform between Android and iOS over Quick Share.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll these things help you spend less time and effort really using the machine to accomplish what you\u2019re trying to do, which hopefully gives you more back for yourself,\u201d Samat said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s really the way in which we want to present this technology to the world and the kind of value proposition behind it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Welch and Gurman write for Bloomberg.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Alphabet Inc.\u2019s Google announced a slew of upcoming features for its Android 17 operating system, showcasing its progress…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":38922,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[24,24017,6528,3962,319,25,532,22939,132,24021,24020,24019,24016,24018,760,2454,573],"class_list":["post-38921","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ai","tag-ai","tag-ai-offering","tag-android","tag-app","tag-apple","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-company","tag-gemini-intelligence","tag-google","tag-ios-device","tag-iphone-maker","tag-pixel-phone","tag-sameer-samat","tag-upcoming-feature","tag-user","tag-video","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38921","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38921"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38921\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38921"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38921"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38921"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}