Bixby 2.0
The launch of Bixby 2.0 by Samsung Electronics is a significant development for this company's innovative home technology. Samsung aims to make its smart devices as intelligent as possible. At the same time, the fierce competition is unlikely to catch up to Amazon, Apple, and Google shortly, given their respective market share and ubiquity. Samsung built this new virtual assistant with this in mind. It has been designed to work with various smart home appliances, including the Galaxy SmartThings.
While many users have enjoyed using virtual assistants, most of us still use them as simple timers or personal assistants. Samsung believes virtual assistants have a more intelligent role to play in the future. Since the release of the Galaxy, Samsung has been working to make Bixby a central part of its software efforts and AI advancements. The company says there are more than 10 million registered users and more than 200 countries where Bixby is available.
Bixby Home
The new Galaxy Note 10+ comes with a redesigned version of Samsung's virtual assistant, Bixby. Compared to its predecessors, this version responds faster. It now appears in a smaller section at the bottom of the screen, with a light background. Its interface also has three new icons:
- The microphone icon in the center
- A keyboard icon for text-based commands
- A home button
Although the virtual assistant is a significant step up from its predecessor, the S Voice, the new version of Bixby, is still very limited to Samsung phones. Although some users may prefer Google Assistant over Bixby, both have practical uses. Try the new Bixby Home app if you're interested in learning how to make the most out of your phone's digital assistant. This app lets you control music playback, change auto-rotation settings, and more.
Bixby Voice
As the company's virtual assistant, Bixby is exclusive to Samsung smartphones and is absent from Android devices from other manufacturers. The company first integrated the virtual assistant in its 2017 Galaxy S8 and its newly released products. This is one of the most intriguing features of a virtual assistant. With a plethora of preprogrammed responses, Bixby can simulate real conversations. It is even able to record conversations.
Besides texting, Bixby Voice can also read text messages, emails, and phone calls. You can switch between a male and female voice by simply saying the words. The new virtual assistant is handy in several areas, and the latest feature is its ability to differentiate between genders. It can also respond to two-step commands like Google Assistant. The newest version of the virtual assistant also has accessibility tools.
Bixby Routines
Using Bixby, you can set up custom routines to automate specific actions on your Galaxy device. Like Google Assistant routines, Bixby Routines can be device-oriented and extremely powerful. Samsung provides a wide variety of suggested routines for different situations. Here are some examples of how you can set up a Bixby routine to help you get the most out of your Galaxy device.
Open Bixby and tap the Discover button. Bixby will then pop up a larger screen where you can see all the services it can interact with. From here, you can type your commands and see the options available. Once you've defined what you want to automate, you can choose from the pre-made routines or create your own. Bixby routines can have multiple actions depending on your selected triggers and activities.
Bixby Marketplace
Bixby is Samsung's new virtual assistant, a successor to the popular Siri. The Bixby Home is packed with apps for interacting with the world. Its Upday news service (available in the UK) and Flipboard (available internationally) are two examples of apps. Bixby Home can also interact with different services, including weather, fitness activities, and IoT gadgets. Many third-party services have been integrated with the Bixby platform, allowing you to access the highlights of various services from one tap.
The Bixby virtual assistant was intended to become a complete ecosystem of products you could use with the Galaxy Home speaker. This aimed to make the assistant an integrated part of the whole ecosystem, enabling it to compete with Amazon Echo and Nest Audio. They introduced the Bixby marketplace in the US in 2019.