Robert Triggs / Android Authority
TL;DR
- A Google Opinion Rewards survey offers us a sneak peek at some potential reimaginations of the Google Search widget that’s current throughout all GMS-equipped Android smartphones.
- Google might add extra buttons, floor on-device content material via common search, present a information showcase, and even make it simpler to look via AI.
In case you use any widespread Android smartphone, likelihood is you’ve unboxed it and set it as much as discover a distinguished Google Search widget within the heart of the house display screen. This Search widget is included as a part of the “Cellular Software Distribution Settlement” (aka MADA), and its positioning and look are uniform throughout all units that ship with the Google Play Retailer. However Google may very well be within the temper to change issues up if a latest Google Opinion Rewards is any clue.
Whereas organising a brand new cellphone, I eliminated the Google Search widget from my residence display screen. Shortly after, Google Opinion Rewards introduced me with a survey, inquiring whether or not I eliminated the Search widget from the house display screen and my causes for doing so. In the direction of the top of the survey, Google requested for my opinion on these potential Search widget reimaginations:
Because the previews present, the Search bar may very well be up for an improve. Amongst the choices introduced within the survey, Google seems to be experimenting with a Search bar widget with these potential functionalities:
- Extra buttons to make it simpler to look in numerous methods.
- The flexibility to seek for on-device content material from inside the Google Search bar is akin to common search performance.
- A information showcase above the search widget bar.
- Capacity to make use of AI search via the search widget bar.
The flexibility to make use of AI with the search widget bar is probably the most fascinating of those choices, because it carefully aligns with Google’s latest ambitions with AI via Google Gemini. Including the power to look with AI via the Search widget and, by extension, probably making it a part of the MADA obligations can be a sure-shot method of getting AI into the arms of many tens of millions of Android customers worldwide.
Observe that Google has not formally confirmed any of those reimagined Search widgets. However the survey does give us a peek at among the prospects of what Google may very well be pondering for the longer term. In some areas, the Search widget permits utilizing completely different search engines like google past Google Search, so how that might play out can also be unknown. We hope to seek out out quickly if Google adjustments the Search widget in any method.
