APK Insight

After adding a fun effect for Valentine’s Day that leverages hardware-accelerated on-device inferencing, the latest version of Google’s consumer video calling service is rolling out. Google Duo 48 details work on a “precall” interface that’s essentially an improved contacts screen, and “Engagement Rewards.”

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Earlier this month, Playmoji on the Pixel 3 was showcased in front of a wide audience at the Grammys. It served as a demo of augmented reality’s many fun use cases. Playground 2.2 now reveals work on AR Animals and the continued development of AR Shopping, as well as another promo with Marvel for International Women’s Day.
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Recent updates to YouTube Music have added major features like Sonos integration, and more minor tweaks from Queue changes to expanded “Add to playlist” availability. YouTube Music 3.03 adds Android Auto support, and continues work on letting users play “sideloaded” songs.

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Betas of the Google app resumed on Monday after a two-week absence, but the release cadence has since increased. Google app 9.27 is rolling out this evening with what appears to be the wide availability of several Material Theme tweaks, Collection sharing, and continued work on Labs.

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Starting in April, Google will begin winding down Hangouts classic for G Suite and eventually regular users. The latter transition is not set to begin until later this year, with Google working on porting over features to Hangouts Chat. In the meantime, Hangouts for Android was just updated with support for Oreo’s notification channels.

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Last month, Google Maps rolled out speed limits and speed camera alerts, while making the Google Assistant feature official at CES 2019. Google Maps 10.10 is now in beta with a new “Personal events” setting, work on automatically deleting Location History, and more.

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After an uncharacteristic two-week delay, the latest Google app beta is now available. Oddly, there are two distinct beta versions of the Google app this evening: 9.21 and 9.23. Both reveal a new Assistant device ID named “nexus” for an upcoming feature or hardware category, as well as a “Labs” feature.

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Recent updates to Google Phone have focussed on expanding Call Screen in the U.S to older Pixel devices, and introduced a dark theme. Google Phone 29 — currently in beta — more widely rolls out the real-time text (RTT) feature that we’ve been tracking for the past several releases.

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In this month’s APK Insight top stories: In January 2019, we uncovered new in-the-works features including Face Match in the Google app, various tidbits from the Android Q System UI, and interface changes in YouTube Music. Keep reading for the biggest Google app secrets we uncovered this month…

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Play Games on Android is one of Google’s most Material Theme-heavy apps. After adding a dark theme in December, the latest version widely rolling out today has redesigned the settings page and tweaked some options.

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The latest beta version of the Google app notably reverses the Assistant dark mode introduced last week. Meanwhile, Google app 9.10 reveals “Avocado” as Face Match for Assistant, targets Android Q, and more.

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Android Q leaked earlier this month and confirmed a number of features like the system-wide dark mode and a renewed focus on privacy. We’ve since been able to get our own hands-on with Google’s next major operating system, and can reveal some upcoming functionality.

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The latest version of Google Duo rolled out over the weekend with hints that Favorites, Low light mode, and filters will soon be live. The former is partially available in Google Duo 46, while we have also enabled Low light mode for improved video calling.

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Since launching last year, Google’s latest streaming service has slowly gained new features, and continues work on others. YouTube Music 2.67 features slight interface changes and tweaks to the now playing queue.

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As a more compact Google Assistant is rolling out, the latest Google app beta suggests that more features are in development. Version 9.5 reveals that a dark mode is in the works for Assistant, as well as additional functionality for the Updates feed.

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The latest Gboard beta is rolling out and continues work on a handful of features we’ve been tracking in recent months. Gboard 7.9 is preparing for more emoticons/kaomoji, faster voice typing, and predictive content search.

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In recent weeks, the latest version of Google Discover has widely rolled out, while the Google app is testing more Material Theme and redesigned Assistant controls. The Google app now jumps from version 8.x to 9.x, with work underway in Google app 9.0 on the new Assistant for the car form factor, Interpreter mode on Smart Displays, and Podcasts.

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Gboard 7.8 rolled out last night in beta with a handful of new voice typing features and changes. In addition to last version’s on-device voice recognition, users will soon be able to associate a Google Account and manually select a language. We’ve also enabled a redesigned emoji selection interface.

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The first update of 2019 for Google’s latest streaming service is now available and reveals more work on reaching feature parity with Play Music. YouTube Music 2.65 continues development on sideloaded tracks and suggests that the app could be pre-installed on devices in the future.

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After a few weeks break due to the winter holidays, the Google app is returning to its usual cadence of weekly beta releases. Google app 8.91 reveals work on applying the Material Theme to even more parts of Google Assistant settings. We’ve also managed to enable auto downloading in Google Podcasts, among other in-development features.

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