Google wants you to make use of Gemini as much as possible and has continued to integrate it in each of its services. A seamless Gemini integration is now being developed at Google for Android, where the company might place a Gemini button on the Android lock screen so users instantly access the AI-powered assistant.
As found by Mishaal Rahman (via Android Authority) in Android 15 QPR1 Beta 2, there is a flag that enables a new way to invoke the default assistant, i.e. Gemini, on Android devices. This flag determines whether a button appears on the lock screen. Currently, tapping the button has no effect.
The button itself is pill-shaped and positioned directly below the fingerprint reader. It’s noticeably larger than the two lock screen shortcuts located at the bottom of the screen. At its center, there’s a sparkle icon, making it stand out visually. The sparkle icon, nowadays is usually associated with AI-powered applications, and in Google’s case, it denotes Gemini.
The new Gemini button on the Android lock screen could help users instantly access Google’s AI assistant without even unlocking the phone. However, Rahman couldn’t make out “what the button is actually supposed to do or if it’s actually something that Google intends to ship.” There’s a possibility that this button exists for Google engineers to purely experiment with upcoming AI features in Android 16 and not ship it in the stable build of Android.
As for Android 16, a report from the same publication last month suggested that the next version of Android will bring a major redesign for the quick settings panel. In the new panel, swiping once still brings down the notifications panel like the current implementation, but the panel now takes up about a quarter of the screen rather than the entire display. Further, you can no longer see any Quick Settings tiles in the new notifications dropdown. On the other hand, the App you are using before you swiped down the panel is visible in the bottom half of the screen.