7 features from other phones I want to see on Google's Pixels

Compared to the barebones Nexus phones of Google’s past, the Pixel series has a lot of great features that make using a Google phone unlike any other smartphone. Whether it’s Call Screening or Now Playing, there’s a lot to love about the Pixel experience, and I’m glad that I returned to it after a long break. But as much as I love my Pixel 10 Pro, there are things I’d like Google to borrow from other manufacturers. From Apple to OnePlus, these are the seven things I want to become a part of the Pixel.

Better volume control

One of my bugbears is when a game or Instagram reel interrupts my music with a loud, annoying sound. Aside from being miffed that my music has suddenly stopped, as someone on the spectrum, I also detest unexpectedly loud noises. A lot of Android skins like Samsung’s One UI, OnePlus’s OxygenOS, and Motorola’s Hello UI have individual app volumes. It’s a feature that provides granular control of volume on a per-app level, so you can silence Instagram or any game that has ads that you can’t mute and leave your music playing.

Another sound-related feature I miss from Samsung and Motorola is using the volume buttons to control media playback. In One UI and Hello UI, holding down a volume key when the screen is on will adjust the volume as normal, but doing so when the screen is off will skip to the next or previous track. I find this particularly useful in the colder weather, where I tend to wear gloves, which makes using the touchscreen or the gestures on my earbuds difficult, but holding down a button is relatively easy. I shouldn’t need a third-party app to do this on my Pixel.

Photographic Styles

Toward the end of 2024, I used an iPhone 16 Pro for a few months, and one of the things I loved the most was Photographic Styles. Unlike a filter that you can add to a photo and tweak after taking it, Photographic Styles can be set as the default so that they apply to every image you take. You’re not stuck with them, though, as you can go into the editor after the photo has been taken to tweak the style, remove it, or swap it for another one.

By comparison, the filters in Google Photos can’t be set as the default, and you can’t save the changes you made to the filter for use on future photos — you have to tweak each image, one at a time, after you take them. Copying Photographic Styles would add some character to the pictures we can take on our Pixels, something that’s sorely needed.

Better widgets

One of the things I’ve missed the most since I traded One UI for the Pixel experience is widget stacks. It’s something Apple introduced back in 2020, and since then, it’s been adopted by several Android skins, One UI included. The name is self-explanatory — you can stack widgets on top of one another, and you can scroll through those stacks on the home screen.

Widget stacks are something that I fully integrated into my routine, letting me access everything from my earbuds controls, Gemini, calendar, Tick Tick, weather, and more, all from the same home screen. It’s more functional, and it looks better, and I would love for Google to adopt it in a future version of Android.

Media controls in Live Updates

Another iOS feature that’s quickly been adopted by Android skins is the Dynamic Island and Live Updates. Notifications that provide ongoing information like Google Maps navigation, food deliveries, and more can display that information in a little pill that either surrounds the camera cutout or lives next to it. Google implemented Live Updates in Android 16, but alas, it lacks the functionality that I wanted most.

Apple, OnePlus, Samsung, and others bundle media controls into Live Updates. A pill with the song name or album art lives next to your selfie camera, and tapping it brings up playback controls. That’s missing from Google’s implementation for Android 16, so because I use Android Auto in my car, and don’t use food delivery apps, this feature is almost useless to me on my Pixel 10 Pro. I understand that Android has a sticky playback notification, but I wish Google would at least give users the option to add music to live updates, too.

Automation

Automation can make a big difference to how useful your smartphone is, and unfortunately, Google’s automation tools on the Pixel are severely lacking. Options are limited compared to Samsung’s Routines or Apple’s Siri Shortcuts, and it’s been one of the most frustrating parts of my time with the Pixel. The Pixel has “Rules,” which can be configured in the settings app and can be triggered by a location or Wi-Fi connection. They control your phone’s sound profile, but that’s it.

By contrast, Samsung Routines has 46 categories for triggers and 35 categories for actions, and they cover everything from location, state of charge across your phone, earbuds, or watch, and many others. One of the routines I used would switch my Galaxy Buds Pro 3 from noise canceling to ambient mode when I arrived at my local store, for example. The options are almost endless, and it highlights how lackluster Google’s efforts are in this area. We shouldn’t need Tasker or other third-party apps to do basic automations that our phone should be capable of out of the box.

Pop-up apps for phones

Freeform windows, more commonly known as pop-up apps, have been supported in Android since 7.0 Nougat, but Google has yet to make use of them on its phones. It looks like Google is going to add the feature to tablets, but there’s no sign of it coming to phones yet, and that’s disappointing. Meanwhile, manufacturers like Samsung, Motorola, and Xiaomi have made it a prominent software feature. It’s something I use constantly when I have a device that supports it, especially Samsung and Motorola phones that make launching pop-up apps easier with their Edge Panels and Side Bar.

I know I’m likely in the minority of users who use split-screen and pop-up apps on a phone, but introducing Freeform windows to the Pixel lineup would be a major multitasking upgrade, and perhaps more people would learn to love it if it were more widely available.

Gesture control

The 2013 Moto X is beloved for a lot of reasons, and one of them is the ingenious gesture controls that are still one of the best parts of using a Motorola phone today. A double karete chop toggles the torch, while a double flick of the wrist launches the camera. I get so used to these gestures whenever I use my Moto Razr that I end up trying them with every other phone I have, and invariably getting disappointed when I realise they aren’t there.

The Pixel does let you double-tap the back of the phone to trigger a list of actions, including the torch, but it’s not very reliable in my experience, especially compared to the twist and chop gestures in Motorola’s phones.

I love my Pixel 10 Pro, and I love what Google has done with Android 16, but other Android manufacturers, and even Apple, have features that would make the Pixel even better, and these are the ones I want most. Besides, if these became Android features in general, not just Pixel features, they’d be available to all brands and all skins, and that’s a win for Android in general. Are there any features you’d love to see brought to Pixels or stock Android? I’d love to hear from you in the comments.