If you’ve purchased an Android phone in the last year, you’ve probably noticed how full of Artificial features it has. Sometimes you knew about them before you hit purchase, sometimes you assumed ( carefully as it turns out ) that there would be some sort of AI on your new smartphone, or sometimes they took you completely by surprise.
Before you even considered downloading the ChatGPT software, you’ll had had access to Gemini, Circle to Research, Bixby, and Galaxy AI, for example, if you had purchased a Samsung Galaxy S25. In order to differentiate, phone makers tried to fill products with their own programs, companies, and overwrought UIs in the early weeks of Android. Which sparks the problem: Is AI the fresh Android bloatware?
Why Android phone makers have adopted the notion that AI may be a useful tool to distinguish them from their competition is easy to understand. Most affordable Android phones also have the same features as their predecessors, including a major Android device from Qualcomm, the most recent Android software, a dynamic cameras system, and a power that will last a day or more. The truth is that we’re often cutting bristles when trying to suggest one over another.
Android phone makers were eager to tap into those choices when conceptual AI first started to emerge, giving the potential to bring new activities to wireless devices. Here was a brand-new opportunity to stand out and provide customers a new reason to choose them over a company. ( And over the iPhone, as Apple slow-walks Apple Intelligence into being. )  ,
In fact, it’s not quite playing out that way, and for a number of causes. First, study conducted by CNET and supported by the findings of independent business analysts constantly shows us that people aren’t upgrading their devices due to the availability of AI functions. Otherwise, their top priorities are value, longer battery life, storage, and cameras. In other words, they’ve put the exact importance on the same things they’ve prioritized years when selecting a new phone.
The second problem is that in lieu of some companies ‘ best attempts, AI isn’t the difference they thought it would be. The main reason for this issue is that, thanks to Google Gemini, there isn’t very many Android phones available today that don’t already have the most cutting-edge technology built into them. Every Android phone manufacturer has its own distinct AI flavour, but more often than not, this results in a haphazard addition of quirky features to the software, giving off a Frankenstein-like quality.
Early-mover benefits: Galaxy AI
Samsung has the best chance of making its own AI product stick in our minds out of all the Android phone manufacturers trying to do so. In contrast to its rivals, it was still fairly first to jump on the AI trend, and Galaxy AI was launched in January 2024, giving it a strategic foothold that it has relied on ever since.
Last year it followed the release of its latest handsets with an AI website, during which it revealed that 70 % of Galaxy S25 users were using Galaxy AI functions. More than half of them, it continued, used Circle to Hunt. More than 400 million tools will be able to access Galaxy AI this season thanks to it.
When you realize that Circle to Search is a Google function, not a Samsung function, it all seems good. Google, which makes the Android OS, typically hands out temporary specials to Android phone-makers on fresh Gemini features, as it first did with Circle to Search for Samsung in 2024. This time, it did it again with the image-to-video machine that came out with Honor.  ,
It’s definitely a great sweetener for Google’s associations with phone-makers to be able to provide them these exclusives. However, the majority of the independent Artificial mobile tools that have gained media attention are inevitably Gemini features created by Google, not by individual phone makers, and it’s only a matter of time before they are made available for additional Android devices, including Google’s own Pixel phones.
Nothing, according to Ben Wood, chief analyst at CCS Insight, is more critical than Gemini to Google. It is a” proper pillar of the future of Google”. And how better, he continues, to ensure its success than distributing it through the 3 billion Android phones available ( which puts Samsung’s 400 million in perspective )?
Samsung may have the largest market share of any Android phone manufacturer, but when you look at its approach in relation to Google’s, it becomes evident that Galaxy AI, which sits on top of Gemini, is in a position of competition.
Bonus AI
Samsung and another Android phone makers will undoubtedly assert that their own AI variants supplement Gemini rather than compete with it. And this notion has some merit.  ,
Rarely does a phone maker attempt to copy someone Google has previously done. Instead, they look for ways to incorporate their own AI bend, frequently through camera features. But whether they do this well enough for it to create any kind of substantial impact on people’s choices to get their devices is another question completely.
OnePlus started rolling out its own set of AI features to the OnePlus 13 and 13R this year, which were first announced backside in May. These include a few photo-editing equipment as well as an AI content hub called Plus Mind that serves as your repository for crucial data.
According to Arthur Lam in an appointment at the application start, it would be a waste of time for OnePlus to build on features that have already been created by Google. A key part of the company’s AI technique is to “embrace and integrate]Google AI features ] as fast as possible”, he said.
We should also have a unique proposition and concept of what the OnePlus AI may have for, Lam said.  ,
This is where Plus Mind comes in. It’s a fascinating first step for the business, though perhaps not as compelling as a company like Motorola, which is investing in a LAM ( large action model ) rather than an LLM ( large language model ) that will respond to questions with actions, not just words. The concept is that it will utilize its knowledge of your surroundings to cut down on, say, how many phone calls you need to make in order to get coffee or an Uber.
All roads lead to Gemini
Google, in terms of its opinion, thinks it’s “great” that phone makers are creating their personal AI to supplement the set of tools it’s offering. This is the statement made by Android leader Sameer Samat this week to Tech Radar.
” If the features are wonderful, it’s more benefit for the customers and more innovation”, he said. However,” I believe that Google wants to make sure that those two pieces, [Circle to Search and Gemini], are quite easily accessible and recognizable across all the various products that consumers are considering.”
It’s a compelling speech from Samat, which backs up the idea that Google wants to be the ultimate master of the AI laptop experience. As Wood puts it:” All roads lead to Gemini”.
In the end, Google’s approach will help Gemini to become the most popular AI application on Android phones, as well as the company’s budget and talent for AI, which personal phone makers can’t match.
This implies that AI is improbable to be the driving force behind companies like Samsung and OnePlus when it comes to distinction. ” Phone manufacturers are in danger of being left to engage more on product and professional design than Artificial features and capabilities”, said Wood.
Real distinction: The Little tale
One organization that appears to have realized this is Nothing, based in the UK. Over the past year or so, I’ve attended, either in person or nearly, nearly every major Android phone start. A Google consultant on stage promoting the numerous advantages of Gemini is something that most of them share.
The business reversed this trend with the Little Phone 3 start in London earlier this month. Nothing also has a small business discuss– around 0.2 % as estimated by founder and CEO Carl Pei. However, it has managed to flourish and expand in a dynamic, mature phone market since its founding in 2022 mainly as a result of its focus on design.
That doesn’t mean it hasn’t considered AI, but it has a unique perspective. An AI-powered site for collecting and organizing anything essential on your telephone, from screenshots to calendar invites, was released earlier this year. It was a unique feature that’s already been effectively copied by some other phone-makers ( see OnePlus ‘ efforts above ).
Everything uses Gemini, but it doesn’t rely on it as much as its rivals do. At the start of its Mobile 3 earlier this month, Pei explained to me,” We don’t want to do the design side.” ” There’s businesses that are really good at it. They are all competing against one another and have good funding.
Nothing has otherwise created a “model agnostic” AI platform, he claimed. ” When the models get better, we just switch to the best one. Although I believe it is currently powered by Gemini, the most recent and greatest is still in the cards.
The challenging task lies away.
A accommodating approach to AI seems like the safest bet at this time when the technology is changing minute by minute. Android phone makers will have to compete head-to-head to maintain their relevance and effectiveness as Google continues to offer the best-in-class smart AI experiences.
The true battle is one that has been ongoing for the past ten and a half: Apple versus Google. The real distinction we’re seeing in smart AI proper today is between Google Gemini and Apple Intelligence, with the original leading the industry and the latter trailing in its midst.
Phone makers will need to do more than just rely on AI to convince us that their Android offering is truly the best of the best as long as Google attempts to aggressively expand its early AI lead while holding the Android ecosystem in its palm.
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