New options are on the best way for Android telephones and Pixel units due to Android 15’s first quarterly platform replace. New options for all eligible Android telephones embody extra descriptive video captions, a Gemini-powered replace to the Lookout app, and a Spotify extension for Gemini. Pixel house owners are getting a couple of extra updates, together with deeper integration of the Pixel Screenshots app for Pixel 9 telephones.
The improved captions — or Expressive Captions as Google calls them — add descriptive phrases to attempt to seize non-spoken moments in dialogue; assume [gasp] or [applause]. They’ll seem all through the system wherever you may entry video captions, together with social media apps and video messages.
One other accessibility-minded replace targets Lookout, an app that gives audio descriptions of pictures and objects for individuals with low imaginative and prescient or blindness. Google is bringing its Gemini 1.5 mannequin to the Picture Q&A portion of the app to supply higher descriptions of pictures taken or opened with the app. It’s a continuation of an effort Google highlighted at I/O to deliver extra AI options to Lookout.
On the AI entrance, Google is including extra extensions to Gemini Assistant. The Spotify extension lets you play music from Spotify by means of Gemini. When Gemini Assistant debuted, it was lacking primary options like this one — capabilities that the non-AI Assistant has been providing for the higher a part of a decade. That is yet another step towards characteristic parity between Gemini and the usual Google Assistant. Gemini may also get entry to the Utilities extension that’s been rolling out, permitting it to take extra actions in your behalf, like making telephone calls, sending emails, and altering telephone settings.
Different highlights of this replace embody the flexibility to create stickers with Emoji Kitchen inside Gboard, share pictures with a QR code in Fast Share, and an improved scanning mode for receipts and the like in Google Drive.
Pixel telephones get just a little extra with the December characteristic drop, with a number of new options particularly for the Pixel 9 sequence. The decision screening characteristic will get a probably helpful replace with contextual reply strategies. Because the caller speaks to the assistant, you may faucet on a response to reply questions with out selecting up the decision.
The Pixel 9’s Screenshots app additionally will get a couple of updates. Now, whenever you use Circle to Search you’ll have an possibility to avoid wasting that search within the Screenshots app, which appears like a logical place to maintain tabs in your earlier queries. You may as well activate a brand new characteristic to indicate instructed search phrases in Gboard primarily based on belongings you save to Screenshots. And if you happen to’ve added tickets or bank cards to Google Pockets with a screenshot, you’ll be capable of save these within the Screenshots app, too.
There are a handful of different options within the characteristic drop for previous-gen Pixel telephones, together with Id Examine, which would require extra authentication if the telephone detects it’s in a brand new location and delicate settings are being accessed. All of it begins rolling out right now for telephones on Android 15 and Pixel 6 and newer telephones.
