Google recently rolled out an update to its Pixel Screenshots app. If you’ve ever needed a reason to start using the app, then this update could be it. In a report from 9to5Google, the Pixel Screenshots app has been updated and now features integration with Gboard.
A smarter phone
Once you’ve updated the app (it should be version 0.24.433.15), you should get a prompt when you open it. This prompt basically tells you that Pixel Screenshots now integrates with Gboard. Users can get suggestions in Gboard when using it together with the app. These suggestions, honestly, make it feel like our smartphones finally deserve the “smart” in the name.
What happens once the feature has been enabled is that whenever you take or receive a screenshot that contains information, say a song or a product listing, when you open up a relevant app, Gboard will provide an autofill suggestion that’s related to the screenshot.
For example, if someone were to send you a screenshot of a song they are currently playing. With the new feature enabled, if you open an app like YouTube Music or Spotify, one of Gboard’s autofill suggestions is the name of the song in the screenshot.
This also works with shopping where if someone were to send you a screenshot of a product listing. Opening an app like Amazon would prompt Gboard to offer an autofill suggestion of the name of the product. This is a process Google is referring to as a “proactive recall”.
One thing to note is that this only works with Android apps. This means that if you were to open Amazon in your phone’s browser instead of the app, the autofill suggestions won’t work. It is unclear if this is intentional, a bug, or if Google might release another update in the future that offers browser integration as well.
Google’s massive AI push
Google has been making a concentrated effort when it comes to integrating AI across its products and services. In fact, its latest feature drop brought several new AI features. The Pixel Screenshots app is one such example. For those unfamiliar, Pixel Screenshots is an app that helps users manage screenshots on their phones.
Instead of merely acting like a separate folder for screenshots, the app relies on AI to make sense of those screenshots. This means that, instead of it existing as a simple image, the AI can extract potentially useful information out of it. This in turn lets users do things like search for information within those screenshots. The Pixel Screenshots app update is an extension of that.
By extracting the information, it allows Gboard to understand what the screenshot is about and give users more useful and contextual autofill suggestions to make their smartphone experience more efficient. In any case, the update is live and is available for those using Pixel 9 series phones.
