Android 16 is rolling out to Pixel phones today, and along with it, Google’s June Pixel Drop is here to bring a heaping helping of new, exclusive features. Starting today, Pixel phones have access to a fresh Pixel VIPs widget to organize your favorite contacts; custom, AI-generated stickers in Gboard; and expanded access to enhanced, “expressive” live captions that better capture tone and intensity in spoken content.
We’ve seen some of these features already. In May, video of an internal test build of the Pixel Tips app showed off the Pixel VIPs widget, and just yesterday, the widget went live for at least one Pixel user. The new widget allows you to pin up to eight of your favorite contacts to your home screen, providing quick access to key details about and communication history with each person.
Gboard is getting the option to use Pixel Studio to create custom stickers based on your description, improving on the flexibility afforded by Google’s excellent Emoji Kitchen functionality. The AI-generated sticker tool looks a lot like an iOS feature called Genmoji, which similarly creates custom emoji from text prompts. You’ll even be able to make stickers based on photos from your phone’s camera roll.
Google’s highlighting an update to its Magnifier app that allows users to search for text in a live camera view. This feature was spotted yesterday in the latest update to Magnifier (v 2.0.0.745828117), which you can grab from the Play Store right now.
Another existing feature Google’s calling attention to in this update: Google Photos is getting new, AI-powered editing tools that suggest photo tweaks you can implement in a single tap. Google announced this feature on Photos’ 10th anniversary last month.
Finally, Google is expanding the expressive captions feature it announced in December to other English-speaking regions.
Rolling out to Pixel devices now
Some of these features are already available on Pixel devices; others are coming with the Android 16 update that’s rolling out beginning today. It’s a pretty exciting day to own a Pixel.
