It took a year, but Circle to Search has finally won me over from Google Lens

Last year, when Google introduced Circle to Search with the Galaxy S24 Ultra, I was left scratching my head a bit. As a Pixel owner who’d been using Google Lens for a few years now, I found this duplicate feature unnecessary. Who would want a gimmicky Lens alternative whose sole claim to fame was adding one more unnecessary gesture before giving you results?!

As it turns out, the answer is a lot of people do want it. In every poll we’ve done here on Android Authority or on our social platforms, Circle to Search has gotten a lot of positive approval, so much so that I decided to give it a real shake instead of continuing to dismiss it. So, for the past couple of months, I’ve been forcing myself to skip Lens and go to Circle to Search instead, and as much as I hate to admit it, I like it. Prefer it even. Here’s why.

Even though Google Lens exists in the Google search widget, Google app, Chrome browser, and Google Photos, the reason I’ve loved it so much over the last few years isn’t just due to Lens itself but also to the fact that I can trigger it anywhere and anytime on my Pixel phones. I just swipe up on any screen in any app, and I can select any image to trigger Lens on it. This works even in apps where there are no selectable images, like Instagram. Or in websites where the image is embedded in the background.

The problem with that is that it’s a Pixel-exclusive advantage that’s tied to the Pixel Launcher. On any other phone, the swipe-up to Android’s Overview doesn’t let me trigger Lens, so I have to take a screenshot first, open it in Photos, and then use Lens on it. A silly and time-consuming workaround that very few people knew about.

What Circle to Search did is democratize Lens and allow more Android phones and users to access it. For now, yes, Circle to Search is restricted to a few dozen non-Pixel phones, but that’s a few dozen more than Google Lens’ swipe-up gesture ever came to. Many Galaxy S, Z, and A-series phones and tablets have it, along with a few Motorola, OnePlus, Nothing, Xiaomi, HONOR, and TECNO models.

So now, whether I grab my Galaxy S24 Ultra, Nothing Phone 2, HONOR 200 Pro, or my trusty Pixel 9 Pro XL, I can search for things on my screen in the same way across all of them. I don’t have to stop and think about how I can trigger Lens here or there; I just tap and hold the navigation handle and circle whatever I want on my screen. I love this consistency, though I’d just love to see Google bring it to all Android phones once and for all. Gatekeeping it to a few models from every manufacturer doesn’t make sense anymore.

Although I love my Pixel phone’s Now Playing feature, it’s not as easy to trigger on demand. There are often times when I’m watching a video on YouTube, Instagram, or some other social media platform where the music isn’t tagged and I need to know what song that is. In those cases, I’ve been turning to Circle to Search to solve my dilemma. My husband, who often grabs new music suggestions from basketball and football comp videos, has been loving Circle to Search because of this as well.

Putting aside the feature’s weird name in this case, Circle to Search’s Song Search works super well. It uses Google / Google Assistant’s music search, and I’ve had good results with it, whether it’s the original music, a cover, a live rendition, an acapella version, or even just someone humming the notes.

The music icon is just there, so I simply have to tap it when a video is playing, and I get the result: easy peasy. It’s much, much, much easier than trying to trigger Assistant’s music recognition while playing something in another app or finagling a way with two phones to identify a song playing from one on the other. Bless the tech lords for making this so simple now!

While Google Lens development had stalled for a long while, Circle to Search improvements have been all the rage at Casa Google. The feature has received a lot of love in the last year through Pixel Drops and other updates. From the music search mentioned above to AI Overviews, a new Share button to send my friends that lopsided Champion League draw, Pixel Screenshots integration to save the cover of a book I want to read, and shortcuts to see my search history or delete the last 15 minutes, there are many new capabilities for me to dig into. It’s even integrated Google Lens’ one-tap shortcuts for phone numbers, websites, maps, and calendar events, which are absolute time savers.

One of my favorite use cases, though, has been translations and QR code reading. I love using Circle to Search to translate an entire menu or page in an unfamiliar language to English so I can read it. This has been very useful on recent trips to Lisbon and Tirana. It also works on social networks where the translate option isn’t available or isn’t visible on that particular page/tweet/post/etc.

The other task that Circle to Search has made easy is scanning QR codes from my phone’s screen. It baffles me that this wasn’t a thing already — not even with Lens — and I still remember when I bought my first eSIM and had to display the QR code on my husband’s phone to scan it from mine. Lens has since improved a bit and now gives me the code to install the eSIM, but that’s nothing compared to Circle to Search’s built-in QR code detection for every type of code, including eSIM installs. I just trigger it, and I don’t even have to circle or tap anything; the QR code is detected by default with an icon to set up an eSIM or open a QR code’s webpage. Simple as that.

Look, if I’m being honest, I know that Google could’ve kept Google Lens and added all these features to it. As a matter of fact, Circle to Search is not new tech; it’s just a new gesture that triggers Lens with a few extra features, so why did Google have to develop a duplicate and rebrand it?

I think the answer lies around marketing more than anything. “Google Lens” doesn’t sound fun or interesting; it harkens back to an era of company-centric services. “Circle to Search” is snappy, cool, and doesn’t necessarily carry the weight of the big G with it, even if it’s essentially a Google feature. But the name also acts as a description of the feature, which is much clearer than the vague “lens” wording.

I also think that Circle to Search has won a lot of love not just because of its name but also because the gesture itself is simple and satisfying. Unlike Lens, I like that I can specify exactly which parts of an image I want to look at or select some text in addition to an image to add context. Sometimes, that’s all I need to identify a cool watch face for my Pixel Watch 3 or a new wallpaper for my phone. There’s also something utterly satisfying about just drawing a circle on the screen instead of precisely dragging text anchors across words and letters.

At this point, I’m a convert. I rarely swipe up for Google Lens, I just circle… to search. I would love to see Google roll it out to all Android phones, though, and maybe integrate it with Gemini without having to go through the screenshot route to start asking questions about an item.