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After citing “hardware limitations” as the main reason why Google’s Gemini Nano wouldn’t come to the cheaper Pixel 8, the tech giant seems to have found a way to make it work after all.
According to reports from TechCrunch, Google has announced plans to roll out on-device AI features such as recording summaries and smart replies to the Pixel 8. These features have previously been locked to the Pixel 8 Pro, as Google said it had no plans to bring those Nano-powered features to the base Pixel 8 due to differences in the hardware.
For the most part, Google has mostly relied on AI-powered features that rely on the cloud. But now that the company is bringing its features to work on-device, it’s (hopefully) going to open a lot of doors for faster processing and response times.
It is interesting to see Google going back on its claims that Nano-powered features wouldn’t run on the Pixel 8. It’s very likely that the company didn’t see a way to make it work on the lower amount of RAM that the Pixel 8 sports—it offers only 8GB of RAM compared to the 12GB of RAM found in the Pixel 8 Pro. However, after some “testing and validation,” the company is ready to push it out to the Pixel 8 in the latest Android developer build.
This is good news for Pixel 8 owners, as Google will hopefully continue to bring new Nano-powered features to the base Pixel 8 series device. And, if the company can get the AI to work on that base model, it might also be able to get some things to work on the upcoming Pixel 8a, which is rumored to contain very similar specs to the mainline Pixel 8 series.
There was, of course, a lot of uproar when Google said the Pixel 8 wouldn’t offer Nano-powered features. Most notably, the “hardware limitations” reasoning given made it seem like a ploy to push more Pixel 8 Pro sales on consumers.
However, with Samsung bringing Galaxy AI features to older Galaxy devices, it makes no sense for Google to claim such issues, especially since many of the same features found in Samsung’s phones rely on Google’s AI development to run.
No real release date for the AI features has been given, though Google has said it will begin testing them in the next PIxel 8 developer build.