Following Samsung’s announcement of the Circle to Search feature for the Galaxy S24 family, Google surprisingly revealed that its Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro would also have the same feature.
Reports indicated that Google’s Circle to Search feature started rolling out on January 31st for both the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro. It seems to have appeared without requiring a firmware update, suggesting it was a server-side switch.
For users with the latest Google smartphones, there is no clear indication that Circle to Search is active. Users are encouraged to try using the feature, which should work unless it is part of a phased-in deployment by Google.
The Circle to Search feature can be activated by long-pressing the navigation bar, enabling users to circle and highlight items on the screen. This feature is faster and more user-friendly than Google Lens and supports multimodal search queries using both text and images.