Android's September Drop lets Gemini remember where you put your passport

Two of the five features Google announced in its September Android Drop work right now. The rest arrive on a looser schedule.

The one you can use immediately is cosmetic. Google Messages now lets you give each conversation its own background and colour theme: pick a wallpaper or drop in your own photo, and the text bubbles match it automatically, or you set the bubble colours yourself.

Also starting today, Google Keep moves into Messages. A grocery list or a note can be shared and updated inside the chat itself, with everyone in the thread able to view it, edit it and add to it, which turns the usual back and forth about who is buying the milk into a single living document. Reportedly you get to it through the "+" icon in Google Messages.

The more interesting feature is still on the way. Google says you will soon be able to ask Gemini to remember where you put something, saying something like "Hey Google, remember in Find Hub that I put my passport in my bedroom drawer," with an optional photo attached, so that the thing you looked for in four different rooms last time is filed in the same place as your tracked keys and headphones. It needs Android 16 or newer, in countries where both Gemini and Find Hub are supported.

Guided Vision was designed for and with the blind and low-vision communities. Google's examples are reading fine print on a food label, ordering from a menu in a badly lit restaurant, and identifying objects around the house. It is coming soon to phones on Android 9 and up, in countries where Gemini is available, which makes it by far the widest-reaching of the five.

Motion Assist is the opposite case. It puts a subtle bubble overlay on the screen that moves with the vehicle you are travelling in, the idea being that your eyes get a reference for motion your inner ear already feels, and it can be set to switch on automatically or dropped into Quick Settings. The bubble's shape, colour and opacity are all adjustable. It is reported to be coming only to devices running Android 17.

The announcement came from Erik Kay, VP of Engineering for Android Core Platform.