Pixel’s January Feature Drop will bring Circle to Search, Photomoji

Alongside the new ‘Mint’ colour for the Pixel 8 series, Google announced new features coming to Pixel phones in the January Feature Drop.

First and unsurprisingly, Pixel phones are getting ‘Circle to Search,’ a new AI-powered Google search feature that first debuted on the Galaxy S24 series earlier this month. Pixel users can activate Circle to Search by long-pressing the home button or navigation bar and circling/scribbling/tapping something on their phone’s screen to look it up.

Image credit: Google

Alongside Circle to Search, Pixel phones will get a ‘Photomoji’ feature that will let people turn their photos into reactions with on-device Google AI. Samsung also debuted Photomoji at the Galaxy S24 launch event.

The feature appears to work a lot like the iPhone’s ‘Visual Lookup’ feature, which lets people turn parts of photos into stickers. Pixel owners should be able to use this by simply pressing and holding a message and selecting ‘create’ from the reaction tray to make a Photomoji from pictures in your photo library.

Image credit: Google

Finally, Google says Pixel phones will get ‘Magic Compose,’ a generative AI tool for creating text responses that use the context of your messages. To access the feature, Pixel users will first need to turn it on by heading to Settings > Developer Options > AI Core Settings > Enable AI Core Persistent. Once enabled, Magic Compose should become available to use in the Google Messages app.

Image credit: Google

It’s also worth noting that Google is enabling the Pixel 8 Pro’s Thermometer app to take people’s temperatures, but only in the U.S. for now. When you take a temperature with the Pixel 8 Pro, you can save it to your Fitbit profile. Google said to “stay tuned” for Canadian availability.

Additionally, the Circle to Search and Magic Compose features will be exclusive to the Pixel 8 line, while Photomoji will come to the Pixel 3a and newer. Circle to Search will roll out on January 31st.