AI everywhere Googles AI-powered Pixel Sense app could gobble up all your Pixel 10 data The app will reportedly offer contextual suggestions as you use the phone. Ryan Whitwam Mar 4, 2025 3:31 pm | 3 The backs of the Pixel 9 and the Pixel 9 Pro XL. Credit: Kevin Purdy The backs of the Pixel 9 and the Pixel 9 Pro XL. Credit: Kevin Purdy Story textSizeSmallStandardLargeWidth *StandardWideLinksStandardOrange* Subscribers only Learn moreGoogle's AI ambitions know no bounds. A new report claims Google's next phones will herald the arrival of a feature called Pixel Sense that will ingest data from virtually every Google app on your phone, fueling a new personalized experience. This app could be the premiere feature of the Pixel 10 series expected out late this year.According to a report from Android Authority, Pixel Sense is the new name for Pixie, an AI that was supposed to integrate with Google Assistant before Gemini became the center of Google's universe. In late 2023, it looked as though Pixie would be launched on the Pixel 9 series, but that never happened. Now, it's allegedly coming back as Pixel Sense, and we have more details on how it might work.Pixel Sense will apparently be able to leverage data you create in apps like Calendar, Gmail, Docs, Maps, Keep Notes, Recorder, Wallet, and almost every other Google app. It can also process media files like screenshots in the same way the Pixel Screenshots app currently does. The goal of collecting all this data is to help you complete tasks faster by suggesting content, products, and names by understanding the context of how you use the phone. Pixel Sense will essentially try to predict what you need without being prompted.Samsung is pursuing a goal that is ostensibly similar with Now Brief, a new AI feature available on the Galaxy S25 series. Now Brief collects data from a handful of apps like Samsung Health, Samsung Calendar, and YouTube to distill your important data with AI. However, it rarely offers anything of use with its morning, noon, and night "Now Bar" updates.Pixel Sense sounds like a more expansive version of this same approach to processing user dataand perhaps the fulfillment of Google Now's decade-old promise. The supposed list of supported apps is much larger, and they're apps people actually use. If pouring more and more data into a large language model leads to better insights into your activities, Pixel Sense should be better at guessing what you'll need. Admittedly, that's a big "if."In a separate leak, images purported to be from a test version of Pixel Sense were posted to a Telegram chat. They show several pages of text that emphasize the app's ability to "help you complete tasks faster."Gemini evolutionPreviously, Pixel Sense (ne Pixie) was shaping up to be an enhanced version of Assistant exclusively for Pixel phonesthis was before Google aggressively pushed Assistant to the side in order to make Gemini the default assistant across its portfolio. The Gemini brand didn't even exist the last time Pixie was in the news, but now it sounds like another application for Google's rapidly evolving on-device AI capabilities. A person known only as Mystic Leaks claims these screenshots are from an early version of Pixel Sense. A person known only as Mystic Leaks claims these screenshots are from an early version of Pixel Sense. The idea of Google's AI snooping through all your app data probably makes your skin crawlfair. There are reasons to be skeptical of this level of access, but the report claims Pixel Sense will rely on local AI processing just like Samsung's Now Brief. So, instead of piping all your app data into a black box cloud server, the content remains on your phone to be processed by the Gemini Nano model in a more secure manner. It would also work offline.The reappearance of Pixel Sense suggests Google is planning to vastly expand the AI processing that happens in your pocket. Google's mobile AI journey began modestly, with features like Recorder summaries and Magic Compose (AI text rewriting) plugged into the Gemini Nano model. With each phone release and Pixel Drop, Google adds a few more features and apps powered by on-device AI. In fact, the latest Pixel Drop just added scam detection to the list of features that plug into Gemini and the Tensor chip in Google's latest phones. However, it's impossible to know how good or useful this feature will be. Samsung's Now Brief, for example, was largely disappointing, and that phone runs a version of Gemini Nano for on-device processing.Google regularly makes vague claims about how capable Gemini Nano is, but we only have Google's word to go on here. Third-party support for Gemini and NPU hardware is still lacking, with most parts of Google's AI Edge SDK still at the preview level only. That leaves OEMs like Google and Samsung to show us what on-device AI can do. So far, it hasn't been very impressive.Ryan WhitwamSenior Technology ReporterRyan WhitwamSenior Technology Reporter Ryan Whitwam is a senior technology reporter at Ars Technica, covering the ways Google, AI, and mobile technology continue to change the world. Over his 20-year career, he's written for Android Police, ExtremeTech, Wirecutter, NY Times, and more. He has reviewed more phones than most people will ever own. You can follow him on Bluesky, where you will see photos of his dozens of mechanical keyboards. 3 Comments