Google Assistant

[Update: More info] Google Assistant birthday reminders are already popping-up for some users

Damien Wilde | Sep 17 2020 - 3:06 am PT

The Google Assistant usually has your back but birthday reminders have been a sore point for some time. However, after the recent unveiling of brand new Assistant Snapshot features, some users are reporting birthday reminders popping up on their devices.

According to the team over at Android Police, Google Assistant birthday reminders have already started cropping up unprompted on user devices. For those of us that often forget the day of the week, let alone a friend or family member’s birthday celebration, this will be an absolute godsend.

The reminders pop-up like a normal notification but are gentle enough to spur you into action. While it’s no good getting a notification on the day, the good news is that according to those seeing these pop-ups already, a birthday reminder will crop up around a week or so prior to the actual date.

[Update 09/17]: We’re hearing reports from readers of the birthday reminders popping up on their devices, but we’ve also gleaned some more information on these notifications when they arrive.

After expanding a notification and heading into your Google Assistant Snapshot feed, you’ll get chips for things such as “birthday gift ideas”, view photos of that specific contact, send them a message or start a call, or even view flower shops nearby.

This might prove especially useful if you struggle to think of things to do for a friend or relatives birthday. Let’s hope the feature rolls out more widely in the coming days and weeks.

Thanks Mamun!

An example shared (below) by Android Police reads: “Anthony’s birthday is coming up soon! Do you want to plan something?” It’s also worth noting that these are unprompted notifications that don’t appear to need configuring.

As you can see, you’re able to mark your reminder as “Useful” or “Not useful” allowing you to hide birthday reminders if they are annoying. When you tap the notification itself, you’ll head to the Assistant Snapshot page, which will give you a far greater look at what you have coming up.

Birthday reminders rely heavily on your Contacts, so long as you have a birthdate listed alongside a contact, you should start to see reminders as the feature rolls out. That said, once it has rolled out more widely, you probably won’t have any excuse for not wishing someone “Happy birthday.”