Since the beginning of March, Google Wallet has seen a somewhat uncharacteristic flurry of updates with both new features and behavior changes.

To coincide with the Android 12 push and Material You, Google introduced a pair of weather widgets for Pixel in 2021. With the Android 15 Beta, the exclusive Pixel nature of these weather widgets has been enshrined.

The past year has seen an explosion of AI tools and software, but over the next couple of months, we’re also going to be seeing a lot more AI hardware. Personally, though, I’m just wondering if any of it will become anything more than novelty.

Now Playing on the Pixel is my favorite example of ambient computing that we have right now. Dating back to the Pixel 2 and 2 XL in 2017, it shows what song is playing on the always-on display, lockscreen and notification shade without requiring you to do anything. It’s “better than instant.”

In short order, the explosion of generative AI technology has changed the way we read and write for one another, especially in journalism and blogging. While the many AI tools all appear to be useful on the surface, I fear we’ve lost our human connection along the way.

I feel like a broken record at this point, but amid new leaks of the Pixel 9 this week, there are many still asking Google for a “Mini” device, forgetting that small phones are dead.

I wish Gmail and Google Calendar were built for consumers instead of businesses. That shift could make the suite of apps infinitely more useful. They are already vital in day-to-day use, but the target audience feels more like employees of a company than anybody else. 

Before “Google Podcasts,” there was the ability to play podcasts in Google Search on Android. This straightforward feature was announced a few days after Google added podcasts to Play Music in April of 2016. It was rather emblematic of how Google did two of everything.

This week the United States Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against Apple, alleging that the company has built and maintains an illegal monopoly. Whether or not Apple actually has a monopoly over Android in the smartphone market is up for the courts to decide, but what’s clear is that Apple really wants one.

Fitbit has had a number of back-to-back announcements and changes in recent weeks. I don’t think it was particularly planned to be that away, but the flurry of activity is more promising than not. It starts with a “Google Fitbit” name that cements how the brand is firmly a part of Google, just like “Google Nest.” If Google Fitbit was always the plan, they should have really done that from the start instead of picking a “Fitbit by Google” stopgap that was shown to people for sometime on product packaging and marketing. 

The first two generations of Samsung Galaxy Gear watches in the early 2010s had cameras. Coming in at around 2 megapixels, the quality was unsurprisingly mediocre. With Wear OS having a renaissance, it would be interesting if Google and its partners experimented with cameras.

Accessories are an important part of any tech purchase, and it’s an area where Google Pixel has been lacking. I really hope to see a push from Google’s third-party partners this year for more Pixel phone cases and Pixel Watch bands.

As a platform and ecosystem, Wear OS is in a good place right now. That wasn’t the case three years ago before the Samsung partnership. Wear OS 3 reinvigorated the operating system with the Galaxy Watch 4 serving as the flagship device until the Pixel Watch over a year later. The next hardware milestone was the Snapdragon W5 in mid-2022 giving manufacturers a more capable chip to work with. Also, keep in mind how Google and Qualcomm are working on a RISC-V chip for Wear OS.

The Google app on Android handles a lot of common information requests throughout your day, and I’m not just talking about Assistant, Lens, or Gemini.

Smartphone glass has gotten much better over the years, but Corning’s new Gorilla Armor feels like the first truly big upgrade we’ve seen in a while. I want it on everything.

The service people most want from Google One is YouTube Premium. That is the holy grail for a Google subscription and calls for it will only increase now that Nest Aware and Fitbit Premium are coming — starting in the UK — at no extra cost.

YouTube Music is my streaming service of choice followed by Apple Music. Music is important to both companies given YouTube’s role in music videos and the iPod, but it’s far from the core business.

Biometrics have made it way more conveinent to unlock our smartphones, but there’s a debate on if face, or fingerprint unlock is the better solution. Many Android brands have taken the approach of “why not both,” adding both face and fingerprint unlock to their devices, but Google’s Pixel is the only one that’s done it correctly.

Even before generative AI, it was clear that Google Assistant was in retreat. Now that Google is in its “Gemini era,” what’s next for Assistant? 

Android TV has been replaced, but it’s apparently still getting new, unique features of its own. Why?

My reservations about Google calling all of its AI features “Gemini” remain, but most users seem to like the branding change. One thing I’ve seen people speculate about is a “Hey Gemini” hotword in the future. 

In testing the Gemini app over the past week, my usage of Google Assistant through Pixel Buds Pro has skyrocketed, and I’m actually liking the balance.

Using a navigation app when out on the road is what just about everyone does nowadays, but these apps are useful for more than just getting directions from point A to point B. Google Maps has supported incident reporting for quite some time, but as we keep moving forward, the feature is becoming essentially useless due to neglect.

In writing about how Gemini is not ready to replace Google Assistant on Android, I’m struck by déjà vu. All the features that Gemini needs to be a good phone assistant is something that another Google product already figured out.