A recent ChatGPT beta is giving a select group of users the ability to turn the AI into their device’s new default voice assistant on Android.
This information comes from industry insider Mishaal Rahman on X (the platform formerly known as Twitter) who posted a video of himself trying out the feature live. According to the post, users can add a shortcut to ChatGPT Assistant, as it’s referred to, directly into an Android’s Quick Settings panel. Tapping the ChatGPT entry on there causes a new UI overlay to appear on-screen, consisting of a plain white circle near the bottom of the display. From there, you verbally give it a prompt, and after several seconds, the assistant responds with an answer.
You can now talk to ChatGPT from any screen on your Android device!With the latest ChatGPT beta update, you can now add a shortcut in your Quick Settings panel that opens ChatGPT’s Assistant overlay. This overlay can appear over any screen, letting you talk to ChatGPT no matter… pic.twitter.com/hHvHGXPYWcJanuary 22, 2024
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The clip shows it does take the AI some time to come up with a response – about 15 seconds. Throughout this time, the white circle will display a bubbling animation to indicate it’s generating a reply. When talking back, the animation turns more cloud-like. You can also interrupt ChatGPT at any time just by tapping the screen. Doing so causes the circle to turn black.
Setting up
The full onboarding process of the feature is unknown although 9To5Google claims in their report you will need to pick a voice when you launch it for the first time. If they like what they hear, they can stick with a particular voice or go back a step to exchange it with another. Previews of each voice can be found on OpenAI’s website too. They consist of three male and two female voices. Once all that is settled, the assistant will subsequently launch as normal with the white circle near the bottom.
To try out this update, you will need a subscription to ChatGPT Plus which costs $ 20 a month. Next, you install either ChatGPT for Android version 1.2024.017 or .018, whatever is available to you. Go to the Beta Features section in ChatGPT’s Settings menu and it should be there ready to be activated. As stated earlier, only a select group of people will gain access. It's not a guarantee.
Future default
Apparently, the assistant is present on earlier builds. 9ToGoogle states the patch is available on ChatGPT beta version 1.2024.010 with limited functionality. They claim the patch introduces the Quick Setting tile, but not the revamped UI.
Rahman in his post says no one can set ChatGPT as their default assistant at the moment. However, lines of code found in a ChatGPT patch from early January suggest this will be possible in the future. We reached out to OpenAI asking if there are plans to expand the beta’s availability. This story will be updated at a later time.
WhatsApp may receive its own version of Apple’s AirDrop as a recent Android beta shows hints that a file-sharing feature is in the works.
A post on WABetaInfo offers insight into the potential update. Like AirDrop, the feature only works between two people. Both users will need to have the software open to the tool and be “within close proximity” to exchange files. What’s particularly interesting about this file sharing is the receiving person will need to physically shake their smartphone to create a share request.
WABetaInfo explains this is to maintain a “controlled approach to file exchanges” between contacts. It's similar to how AirDrop lets people configure its settings so they only receive content from trusted sources. However, the website claims it will be possible to share media with non-contacts on WhatsApp. Phone numbers will remain hidden in this situation to preserve anonymity.
And just like sending messaging on WhatsApp, file sharing is end-to-end encrypted according to the website, ensuring personal information and content being sent is protected from outside interference.
Pending information
That’s pretty much all that is known about WhatsApp’s file-sharing feature. A lot of the finer details have yet to be revealed.
It’s unknown exactly how sending media to non-contacts will work. Will all receiving users have to shake their device too or will Meta change its mind and throw out that step replacing it with a simple menu setting? Going back to AirDrop, Apple’s version lets you change the receiving setting to Everyone allowing non-contacts to accept content from you.
Additionally, we don’t know if there are any file-size limitations for shared files. The maximum size for sending media to group chats is 2GB at the moment. The upcoming feature will probably have a similar size although it would be nice to see Meta expand the limit. Considering that we live in a world where 4K videos exist, an expansion would be great to have.
No word on when this update will become available to beta testers. WABetaInfo states the tool is still under development, so a preview build doesn’t exist yet. If you’re interested in trying out the file-sharing feature once it’s ready, you can become a WhatsApp beta tester by joining the Google Play Beta Program. You may be one of the lucky few to gain access down the line.
Analysis: cross-platform sharing
One thing we would like to see is compatibility across different operating systems. Imagine being able to send files from an Android phone to an iOS device and vice versa. It would certainly give WhatsApp an edge over Quick Share.
If you’re not familiar, Google and Samsung recently entered a partnership that resulted in many new products and combining Nearby Share into Quick Share. Now Android users can use the function for quick file sharing, hence the name. Assuming Meta rolls out the update in its current state, it could cause a lot of confusion as people would arguably be receiving the same thing twice. Giving WhatsApp's tool cross-platform support would make it stand out considerably.
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We can't say for sure whether or not AI is secretly plotting world domination – but it does appear that ChatGPT developer OpenAI has designs on replacing Google Assistant as the default helper tool on Android devices.
Some digging by the team at Android Authority has revealed hidden code in the latest version of the ChatGPT app for Android: code that triggers a small pop-up prompt at the bottom of the screen, just like Google Assistant (or Siri on the iPhone).
The thinking is that you wouldn't have to launch ChatGPT for Android to get answers from the AI bot – you could just hold down a shortcut button, or even say “hey ChatGPT”. There also seems to be a new tile in the works for the Quick Settings panel on Android, giving users another way of getting to ChatGPT.
This wouldn't exactly be a hostile coup – Android already allows the default digital assistant app to be switched, to something like Alexa or Bixby – but it's interesting that OpenAI wants to expand the reach of ChatGPT. As always though, plans can change, so it's not certain that we'll see this functionality appear.
Store opening
In other ChatGPT news, the GPT Store that OpenAI promised last year is now scheduled to launch next week, after a delay – as per emails sent out to people signed up to a paid ChatGPT plan. It means users can create their own bespoke versions of ChatGPT and sell them on to other people and businesses.
These GPTs – or generative pre-trained transformers – are built on the same well of training data as ChatGPT, but they can be tweaked to take on specific personalities or accomplish particular tasks. Some rather obvious examples would be a bot that helps with tech support questions, or one that comes up with recipes.
Custom bots can also be loaded up with knowledge from outside OpenAI's vaults – so if you've written a hundred scientific papers on dinosaur fossils, for example, you're able to plug all of this data into a GPT and ask questions about the research. Right now, you need a ChatGPT Plus or Enterprise account to build a bot.
OpenAI is no doubt trying to foster the same kind of innovation and growth that we've seen in smartphone apps, ever since Apple opened the iPhone App Store in 2008. However, at the moment we're still waiting on a lot of details, including how users can get verified, and how sales revenue will be split.
That didn't take long: just days after launching a dedicated Copilot app for Android, Microsoft has restored balance to the universe again by making the same app available for those users who prefer iPhones and iPads.
As initially spotted by The Verge, the Copilot app for iOS and iPadOS seems to be an exact replica of the Android one, and is also free to use. The same rules apply: you can use it in a limited fashion without logging in, but signing into a Microsoft account gives you more prompts and more features (like image generation capabilities).
If you do sign in with a Microsoft account, then you can enable the latest and greatest GPT-4 model from Microsoft's partner OpenAI. Responses will generally be slower but better, and bearing in mind that ChatGPT customers have to pay to get the GPT-4 version, this is a pretty good deal from Microsoft.
While it's a notable move from Microsoft to give Copilot its own app, this hasn't come out of nowhere: pretty much all of the functionality here was previously available in the Bing apps for Android and iOS, so little has changed in terms of what you can do.
Copilot everywhere
If you're completely new to generative AI, these tools can produce text and images based on a few user prompts. You can get Copilot to do anything from write a poem about TechRadar to produce an image of a glowing Apple iPhone.
You can also get Copilot to query the web – if you need party game or travel ideas, for example – and have it explain complex topics in simple terms. It's a bit like a supercharged version of Google Assistant or Siri from Apple.
Microsoft is continuing to push forward quickly with upgrades to Copilot, as it knows that the likes of Apple and Google are busy improving their own generative AI tools. It looks inevitable that AI will be one of the hottest tech trends of 2024.
And if you don't want to install Copilot on your phone, you can find it in plenty of other places too. The same features are still available as part of Bing on the web, and Copilot has also now been added to Windows 11 and Windows 10.
If you're keen to play around with some generative AI tech on your phone, you now have another option: Microsoft has launched an Android app for its Copilot chatbot, and like Copilot in Windows 11, it's free to use and powered by GPT-4 and DALL-E 3.
As spotted by @techosarusrex (via Neowin), the Copilot for Android app is available now, and appears to have arrived on December 19. It's free to use and you don't even need to sign into your Microsoft account – but if you don't sign in, you are limited in terms of the number of prompts you can input and the length of the answers.
In a sense, this app isn't particularly new, because it just replicates the AI functionality that's already available in Bing for Android. However, it cuts out all the extra Bing features for web search, news, weather, and so on.
There's no word yet on a dedicated Copilot for iOS app, so if you're using an iPhone you're going to have to stick with Bing for iOS for now if you need some AI assistance. For now, Microsoft hasn't said anything officially on its new Android app.
Text and images
The functionality inside the new app is going to be familiar to anyone who has used Copilot or Bing AI anywhere else. Microsoft has been busy adding the AI everywhere, and has recently integrated it into Windows 11 too.
You can ask direct questions like you would with a web search, get complex topics explained in simple terms, have Copilot generate new text on any kind of subject, and much more. The app can work with text, image and voice prompts too.
Based on our testing of the app, it seems you get five questions or searches per day for free if you don't want to sign in. If you do tell Microsoft who you are, that limit is lifted, and signing in also gives you access to image generation capabilities.
With both Apple's Siri and Google Assistant set to get major AI boosts in the near future, Microsoft won't want to be left behind – and the introduction of a separate Copilot app could help position it as a standalone digital assistant that works anywhere.
Google has quietly added a new module to its Contacts app on Android allowing users to see the location of friends and family in real-time.
It’s worth mentioning this function has been in the works for some time now – since late May when it was leaked by industry insider Nail Sadykov on X (the platform formerly known as Twitter). It took a little while, but now you can get this feature by installing Google Contacts version 4.22.37.586680692.
According to Android Police who initially discovered this, the location-sharing banner will be powered by Google Maps, sitting between the contact options and the Contact Info section. Tapping it instantly “opens their location in [Maps]” where you can then get directions to them. Conversely, if a friend is heading towards you, you can set up notification alerts letting you know when they’ve arrived at your location.
You need to meet a couple of requirements to make this update work. First, you must have the other person’s Gmail address saved onto your copy of the app. Second, they must be actively sharing their location on Google Maps. If those two criteria are met, the banner will appear on the contact card.
Setting up Location Sharing
Setting up the feature is easy. If you tap the profile picture on Google Maps, you will see the Location Sharing option in the menu. Select it, then hit the Share Location button on the following screen. After that, decide which of your contacts you want to share your real-time data with. Often, people will elect to temporarily show their location by picking out a time limit, but we recommend selecting “Until you turn this off” if you want people to find you.
(Image credit: Future)
Keep an eye out for the patch when it arrives as it may be rolling out in waves. We updated Google Contacts on our Android device, however, we didn’t see any changes. It could still be making its way to all users or we were just unlucky.
It's been quite the week for Beeper Mini, the new Android app that promises to bring full iMessage functionality to Android. Having launched a few days ago, with the hope of FaceTime calls in the future, it's now been blocked by Apple – though the Beeper Mini team is promising to restore functionality.
Beeper Mini does something that hasn't been done before: it actually reverse engineers Apple's iMessage protocols to properly interface with the chat service. In other words, it makes your Android phone look like an iPhone to iMessage.
Although Beeper Mini promises end-to-end encryption support, it still poses “significant risks to user security and privacy” according to Apple, which is why Apple has now blocked Beeper Mini access. At the time of writing, those blocks are still in place.
“We will keep it working,” Beeper co-founder Eric Migicovsky posted, after Apple took action. You can still use the cloud Beeper service to access iMessage from non-Apple devices – but, like Sunbird and Nothing Chats – this uses a less secure method, deploying Mac computers as intermediaries to fool the iMessage service.
The green bubbles are staying
(Image credit: Future / Apple)
In the US, where iPhones dominate, much is made of Android users showing up as green bubbles in conversations, without support for advanced iMessage features like reactions and message editing. In other countries, many users have switched to alternative apps such as WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger, which work the same on any smartphone.
While Apple has now said it will support RCS in 2024 – that's the upgraded version of SMS, with extras like read receipts and high-resolution image support – Android users will still show up as green bubbles. These colors seem to be hugely important to some people, even though Android users are getting closer to feature parity under the hood.
The problem for anyone trying to recreate iMessage on Android is that Apple doesn't allow any third-party access to the service. Unless Apple actually decides to release iMessage for Android, anything else is going to be a workaround – and no matter how clever that workaround is (Beeper Mini is the cleverest yet), Apple can theoretically shut it out.
From Apple's perspective, it wants to keep iMessage secure and private for its users, but we also know it wants to keep people locked into using iPhones. Despite pressure from Google and the EU, green bubbles are staying around for the foreseeable future.
WhatsApp is officially giving users the ability to send out temporary voice messages to their contacts.
We say “officially” because this feature has actually been around for the past two months or so although it was in a beta state. People in the beta program were the only ones who had access at the time. Don’t worry about feeling like you missed out because the View Once messages, as they’re called, function exactly the same as before. Meta didn’t make any changes with the official release.
You start by holding down the record button, then swipe up to lock it. Recordings must be locked first in order to make the View Once icon (which is the number one inside the circle) appear in the bottom right-hand corner. Tap it once to activate it and a timer will be attached to the message. Hit Send and you’re done
(Image credit: Future)
A few limitations
From there, the recipient has two weeks to listen to the recording. You’ll know they’ve listened when the little receipt marker appears below the message. If they ignore it the entire time, WhatsApp will automatically delete it. Do note you’ll be unable to save, share, or forward these self-destructing voice messages.
It is possible to restore a recording from a backed up chat room, but only if it was never opened in the first place, according to a page on WhatsApp’s support website. If it was already heard, then you’re out of luck. Another one will have to be sent.
The update is currently rolling out globally to all WhatsApp users on Android and iOS devices. Be sure to keep an eye out for the patch when it arrives over the coming days. We reached out to Meta asking if there plans to add the same feature to the desktop app. If you’re not aware, the company gave WhatsApp on desktop the ability to send self-destructing images and videos. Perhaps it’ll also receive support for temporary voice messages. This story will be updated at a later time.
In November, Apple announced it will finally support the RCS messaging standard allowing Android devices and iPhones to communicate on a potentially more level playing field. The update won’t arrive until early 2024, but luckily there is a third-party solution that you can download today called Beeper Mini.
The app gives Android users the ability to send end-to-end encrypted texts to an iPhone using Apple’s very own iMessage protocol. This means both parties will see all messages in blue bubbles instead of forcing Android hardware to green bubbles. You don’t need an Apple ID to use the service. Even if you had one, the developer Beeper says it doesn't have access to your Apple account. Users will, however, need to give Beeper Mini permission to access their phone’s SMS and Call Logs to verify the number as well as sync to pre-existing conversations to convert them into proper iMessage chats.
(Image credit: Beeper Mini)
Looking at the official Google Play Store listing, you’ll find Beeper Mini has a multitude of iMessage features. You'll be able to send full-sized photographs and videos to others as well as react to their content with an emoji. The app also allows you to join previously inaccessible iPhone-only group chats. Plus, the software offers a way to sync iMessages across other “Android or iOS devices, including” iPads.
Other notable features include typing status, read receipts, unsending, and more. Beeper Mini is available for download now. You will need to pay $ 1.99 to use the service although the developer is offering a seven-day free trial to start.
How it works
You may be wondering how is this even possible. It’s complicated to say the least.
The way it works, according to an official blog post, is that an SMS text is sent from an Android number to Apple’s “Gateway service.” The gateway then responds with its own message and sends the initial text to Apple servers registering it as an iPhone. This process was made possible by security researcher and reported high school student JJTech who reportedly managed to “reverse engineer” iMessage’s protocol. Beeper took JJTech’s work (presumably with their permission) and then implemented it in their app.
The developer also created the Beeper Push Notification service, or BPNs for short, to maintain a constant connection to Apple servers and to tell you of any new texts.
That’s the gist of how it works. If you want more details, we highly recommend reading Beeper’s post along with JJTech’s iMessage breakdown to get the full picture.
Analysis: Potential trouble
Now you may be wondering, is Apple okay with this? It's tough to say. Things are a little weird right now.
Eric Migicovsky, CEO of Beeper, told TechCrunch a provision in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act states that “reverse engineering for the purposes of interoperability is protected”, implying that the law protects them from litigation.
This hasn’t stopped Apple from suing other companies using their services. However, now we have the Digital Markets Act which forces tech corporations to support interoperability for their messaging platforms. What’s more, the US DOJ (Department of Justice) has been going after titans in the industry over alleged antitrust violations. Right now, it’s going after Google.
Apple might let Beeper Mini slide on by to stay in the good graces of the DOJ. But it’s hard to say for sure. We’re in uncharted territory here. Apple could, at any time, strike down the app with the force of a thousand suns. It’ll be interesting to see how this situation plays out.
2024 is about a month away, and to celebrate the end of the year, Google has named the winners of the Google Play’s Best of 2023 Awards.
For the sake of brevity, we're going to primarily focus on the best Androids apps as the company introduced a new categories for this year, such as Best with AI and Best Multi-device App. This caused the list to grow by a significant amount so we couldn’t include the likes of the best Chromebook or best tablet apps (If you’re curious to know, the winner of the best Chromebook app is FlipaClip, software that can help people create 2D animation, and the winner for best tablet app is Concepts, a vector-based drawing tool).
Google states the list on its blog is centered around the American winners. Other countries are said to have different winners. However, when we looked at other region, the entries matched the US list except for a single outlier which we’ll shout out later on.
Android Apps of the Year
1. Imprint: Learn Visually
(Image credit: Future)
Google has given the Best App of 2023 award to Imprint: Learn Visually, an education software that strives to teach you new skills and the world around you in bite-sized lessons. It offers a personalized experience where you can learn about topics that interest you from human history to psychology. And Imprint does this via eye-catching visual storytelling.
Spotify has earned the Best Multi-device App award for allowing music streaming across a variety of locations – be it in the kitchen, on the commute to hike, or out on the town. The company highlights the service’s ability to “remotely control playback on another device”. Plus, you can download your favorite songs for offline listening. What’s interesting, it's the only music streaming app on the whole list.
At the beginning of November, Google allowed people to come in to vote for what they believed was the best app of the year. Winning the Users’ Choice Award is ChatGPT, which isn’t surprising in our opinion. ChatGPT took the world by storm in 2023 as one of the premiere generative AI platforms and whose technology fuels Microsoft’s Bing Chat. On top of that, 2024 is shaping up to be a big year for it.
If you’re looking to make new friends or have recently moved to a different city, the company recommends installing Bumble For Friends (BFF for short) on your smartphone. It differs from the regular Bumble app as it doesn't focus on helping you find dates. Instead, BFF is all about helping you make genuine friendships, as the name suggests, with others in your local area
Voidpet Garden: Mental Health won the Best for Personal Growth award and it’s pretty unique. Its goal is to help you practice mindfulness and self care as a way to improve your mental health. It does this in a Pokemon-esque manner by having you collect Void Pets which are said to be creatures born from negative emotion. You raise these creatures by completing tasks in order to turn them into celestial-looking dragons with each representing a positive attribute about the user.
Artifact: Feed Your Curiosity is similar to Imprint: Learn Visually in that it’s an app that can teach users about the world, but it does so in a different way. The service functions like X’s (formerly known as Twitter) Explore page by offering a curated stream of news articles from across the internet. It covers a variety of topics like the tech industry, politics, and gaming. Users even have the option to mark certain stories as clickbait for better curation.
In the UK, the award went to ReciMe, a social platform where home cooks share their family recipes.
Aware is another mental health app like Voidpet Garden although it takes a more grounded approach towards mindfulness. It’s a type of journaling software housing “science-based exercises [alongside] live guided sessions”. You don’t have to create an account, plus it’s totally free. No subscription necessary.
It’s worth mentioning this has the least amount of downloads out of everything on this roundup although we do expect it to grow exponentially since it won the Best Hidden Gem award.
Despite winning the Users’ Choice award, ChatGPT was effectively snubbed by Google as it didn’t get the crown for Best AI. That honor went to Character AI, an app filled with personality-driven chat bots that you can talk to. For example, you can talk to Amelia Earhart, Julius Caesar, or Poseidon, God of the Ocean. People can even talk to Whiskers the Cat.
As you can probably guess, it’s not meant to be taken seriously. It aims to be a fun interactive experience – almost like a video game.
For families, Google has given the nod to PAW Patrol Academy, an app where young kids ages two to five can learn problem-solving skills, gain confidence, and get in touch with their creative side. It features characters from the popular animated series in a variety of interactive adventures as well as clips from certain episodes. What’s more is it doesn’t need to connect to Wi-Fi so kids can enjoy it on the go.
Rounding out the list of Google’s best Android apps for 2023 is AWorld in support of ActNow. Its purpose is to teach people how to counteract climate change by calculating their carbon footprint and learn how they can change their lifestyle to reduce the impact they may have on the environment. The software will recommend basic activities like planting trees to lessen carbon emissions or use natural products among other things. AWorld will also encourage you to join group challenges by completing a set number of environmentally-friendly actions.
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