Google is planning a design change for the Search widget that has been on the home screen of Android phones for years. New screenshots revealed that Google is exploring more advanced and interactive options for the widget.
Is the Android Search widget changing?
The search widget has been a staple of home screens since the early days of the mobile operating system. Device manufacturers are also required to pre-install the widget on the home screen of phones that ship with the Google Play Store.
However, Google seems to want to improve the search box functionality. A recent survey by Google Opinion Rewards presented concepts for a new design of the widget. These included additional buttons to enable different search modes, integrating on-device content search directly into the widget, and news feed options in the search bar.
The most important of the concept sketches was an “AI search” feature accessible from the widget. This is part of Google’s goal to integrate search with AI and could enable Android users to perform more sophisticated searches.
Integrating AI into the Search widget also means the opportunity to bring the capabilities of Google Gemini to a wider audience around the world.
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It is unclear if or when such changes to the widget will be implemented. Android currently allows alternative search engines to be made the default, so widget compatibility is an important question mark.
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