Android 16 & Gemini Could Leave IOS’ Notifications In The Dust

Notifications are a huge part of the smartphone experience. They allow you to see information and perform actions without really needing to interact with your phone. As such, useful notification features can really enhance the overall experience. Android 16’s Magic Actions could make notifications much more intelligent.

It’s important to know that we’re dealing with early information. This feature popped up in an APK deep dive performed by Android Authority. As such, there’s no telling how this feature will perform when/if Google launches it. Since we’re getting close to Google I/O, there’s always the chance that Google will announce it then.

Android 16’s Magic Actions could make notifications much more intelligent

If you use a phone with Android 10 or later, then you know about Smart Actions. When you get certain notifications, you see a set of options for actions you can perform based on the notification. For example, if you get a YouTube notification, you’ll see the option to save that video to your Watch Later playlist. This eliminates the need to open the YouTube app and add it manually.

Well, Magic Actions could give you even more options for actions that you can do based on your notifications. What’s neat is that they’ll be powered by Gemini, which means that you’ll have much more powerful AI behind the feature. So, rather than only performing actions based on the app that the notification is for, your phone could do relevant actions in other apps.

One example provided by Android Authority explains what happens if you get a notification about a canceled flight. Ostensibly, Magic Actions could draft an email to the hotel you have booked, letting them know about the delay. Also, it could offer to call the airline’s customer service. This is just a hypothetical example, but it seems like the logical next step for the current Smart Actions.

Android 16’s features will be largely AI-powered, and Magic Actions might be one of the most popular ones. Right now, we don’t know if this feature will be exclusive to Pixel phones, so we’ll also have to wait for that information.