Back in June, YouTube announced that it was beginning to roll out Picture-in-Picture (PiP) to the iOS app for Premium subscribers. That said, the Google video site has yet to make it widely available, though it just extended the opt-in testing period again.

Like email, the experience of searching through files can always benefit from improvements. For its part, Google Drive is in the process of beta testing search chips to “help users refine their search and locate files faster.”

One of the first major announcements at I/O 2021 was Google’s initiative to offer a more integrated and interactive Workspace experience. The latest “Smart canvas” features are now here, including AI summaries in Google Docs.

Over the past year or so, Google has been working to optimize its app for tablets, foldables, and other large screen devices. YouTube Music is the most recent example with more tablet UI updates planned in the future.

Google+ shut down in April of 2020 as a social network for consumers, but the product was kept around for businesses that wanted an internal tool to communicate with employees in a post/stream-like manner. Citing low usage, Google is shutting down Currents and replacing it with Spaces in the new integrated Gmail/Chat.

Over the past year, Google has been encouraging developers to optimize their apps for tablets and foldables. After having done so, Chrome has seen an 18x increase in multi-window usage on large screen devices.

Fitbit today offered a number of guided programs as part of its premium subscription. The Google-owned company is now testing one called Quantified Self that’s personalized and involves using “Fitbit data to figure out which strategies can meaningfully boost your stats.”

Google is rolling out a pair of new Android widgets for Chrome today, while making official the previously experimental “Journeys” feature that lets you “revisit past explorations grouped by topic.”

Following Samsung’s tease yesterday afternoon, Google today provided more details on the new Assistant experience coming to Wear OS, including its new design.

After we enabled on Wednesday, Google Messages is starting to roll out the navigation drawer redesign in Photos integration.

The Google Chrome icon is in the process of being updated and modernized for the first time in eight years. This is meant to better “align with Google’s more modern brand expression,” with the company now optimizing the logo for each operating system.

Google’s latest move to boost Workspace targets businesses that have existing email systems, but do not have access to modern productivity apps. The big selling point of Google Workspace Essentials Starter edition is how it’s free with “no limited trial period.”

YouTube tends to overhaul its website and mobile apps component-by-component. The latest example of this is a big redesign, especially in fullscreen mode, of the video player in YouTube for Android.

As we spotted in November and following the latest push for RCS support on iPhone earlier this month, Google Messages is starting to roll out iMessage reactions in beta for Android users.

The Pixel 4a will certainly go down as a beloved Google phone. With stock running low for months, the writing has been on the wall for this affordable Pixel from 2020. The Google Store today delisted the Pixel 4a. 

Google Lens today is primarily a visual lookup tool for mobile devices, but it’s been branching out to Chrome. The next expansion could see Google Search on the desktop web add Lens.

After teasing last year, Google today finally detailed how the “new Gmail view” redesign is rolling out on the web over the coming weeks and months. 

Like last year, Fitbit has taken until the end of January to release a personalized “2021 Year in Review” based on your health and fitness metrics. Owners of the Google-owned wearables started receiving the email on Saturday.