The incoming List of Pixel 9 phones and the Pixel 9 Pro Fold becomes to the limit in AI functions. Of all the mumbo-jumbo of Magic Editor and Gemini, the only AI feature that stands out is a simple app for saving your screenshots. Pixel Screenshots is an exclusive application for Google phones that lets you browse your screenshots with some AI assistance. After seeing it in action, I see it as a simplified version of Microsoft’s vilified callback functionand that’s a good thing.
My screenshots stick like barnacles to my organized Google Photos app. I use Screenshots as a catch-all for events, notes, and receipts I need to remember. I could remove them from Photos, but that would mean I might miss something I need later. Pixel Screenshots solves this problem by offering a dedicated app to search through my screenshots. The feature uses Gemini Nano to identify text and understand images in the app. If I tell it to look up how much my friend owes me for drinks from last night, it should be able to pull up that information.
Google told Gizmodo that the entire process works on the device and doesn’t require any cloud-based work. Every time you take a screenshot, the app generates a title and summary for the image. You can add a note to the screenshot to help the AI-powered search find your content more easily. And best of all, you can create categories for your different screenshots.
What makes Pixel screenshots different from Microsoft’s recall?
When Microsoft shared Details about the recall for its first wave of Copilot+ PCs Earlier this year, it sparked a wave of concern among privacy-conscious consumers, some hesitant to buy a PC that, right out of the box, takes screenshots of everything they do on it – including passwords and financial information – every few seconds and then stores them on their hard drive. Microsoft has removed the function from the initial release of Copilot+ after researchers discovered that the screenshots were easily accessible without any real layer of security.
Both Google and Microsoft claim that all AI screenshot analysis is done on-device, whether it’s Recall or Pixel screenshots. The advantage for Google is that users can choose what and when they take screenshots. It works with other Google apps too. If it detects that a screenshot contains a date or location, I can add a location to Maps or an event to Calendar with the click of a button.
Recall is supposed to be the always-on reminder machine when you forget what you were looking for the other day. But this feature automatically consumes a not insignificant portion of your storage to fill it with junk screenshots. Microsoft promises that the feature won’t be enabled by default when it’s finally integrated into Copilot+, but I’d still hesitate to enable it for fear of it picking up sensitive information as you scroll.
Pixel phones still save your screenshots to Google Photos, at least for now. My photos are for experiences, while my screenshots are useful as a tech reporter, so I like to keep them separate where possible. We’d also need to use the app more ourselves to give a full impression, but as it stands, it’s one of those features that makes far better use of AI than boring, AI-generated text or clumsy, empty AI art.
