Ryan Haines / Android Authority
TL;DR
- Google has been testing several changes to the Pixel’s Now Playing feature.
- With the latest Android Canary build, we managed to activate a dedicated app drawer icon for the Now Playing feature.
- The app icon takes users to the Now Playing history page within the Android System Intelligence app.
An APK teardown helps predict features that may arrive on a service in the future based on work-in-progress code. However, it is possible that such predicted features may not make it to a public release.
The latest Android Canary build has added a “Now Playing” icon in the app drawer. This icon is disabled by default, but we managed to activate it.
What secrets does the app icon hold? Not much at this stage. Tapping on the icon takes you to the Now Playing history page, which is part of the Android System Intelligence app. You could access this page through a widget shortcut, so it’s not a new access area.
So why is Google planning to promote Now Playing to its own app icon? The company hasn’t officially announced the change or its rationale, but we speculate that it could be to bring more eyeballs to the functionality.
Even though Pixel users are pretty savvy, many wouldn’t know about the Now Playing feature. If they did, they wouldn’t know they could access the history of songs recognized through the feature. While the widget shortcut already exists for the home screen, it’s a fair bit hidden, and some users may never come across it. Giving the functionality its own app icon in the app drawer indicates greater confidence in the app’s ability, enough to start drawing more users to explore the feature.
If you’re hoping that this is an early sign for the feature to expand beyond Pixels, don’t hold your breath. There is no indication that Google plans to expand the Now Playing feature to non-Pixels.
We’ll keep you updated if we find Google making more changes to the Now Playing functionality.
