Back when the Pixel 2 and 2XL launched with Now Playing, it was clear that Google would start saving its best features for Google-made phones. That doesn’t have to be a bad thing. Pixels should have features that make them stand out. Those features shouldn’t be safety-related, though, and I think it’s high time Google made some of its personal safety software into mandatory Android features, not just for Pixel phones.
What can the Pixel do?
Every Android phone I’ve used in the last five years has offered a medical information page that can easily be accessed from the lock screen, as seen in the screenshot from mySamsung Galaxy S23 Ultraabove. The problem in this case isn’t that the feature isn’t widely available; it’s that it isn’t implemented consistently across Android.
In One UI, you fill out your medical info in the contacts app. Some phones move this menu to settings, while the Pixels have a dedicated app called Safety. It lives in the app drawer, so users are more likely to find it than on other devices.
Easy access to potentially life-saving features like this matters. Filling in medical information isn’t something most of us immediately think to do when setting up a new phone, so unless the menu or app is in an obvious place, chances are it will be left empty.
In addition to having emergency contacts and medical information for first responders to check, the Safety app has more useful features. I particularly like the option to share your real-time location with contacts for 24 hours. Whenever I drive long distances, I always share my location with family so they can see my progress and they’ll be able to figure out if anything goes wrong. Doing that with just a few taps like this would save time, and wouldn’t require everyone to decide for the same third-party app like, for example, WhatsApp.
Likewise, the Safety Check option could be a game changer for some people. When you start one up, you’re able to select from a few premade reasons, like walking alone, going for a run, taking public transport, or hiking. You can also create your own reason. Then you choose how long you want the check to last. Only when this point in time is reached will your chosen contact be told that you’re sharing the safety check with them, how long, and why. The idea is that they’ll check in with you at that time, and if anything happened, you can share your location with them with a quick tap.
Sadly, most cities and towns have areas where walking alone isn’t safe, so having this prepped and ready to go could save someone’s life.
Why all Android phones need these features
While Google keeps a lot of features exclusive to its Pixel phones, the company recognized that Personal Safety is a service that all Android users can and should benefit from. With Android 13, Google turned Personal Safety into an optional preloaded service available as part of its GMS package, allowing any manufacturer to add the app to their devices.
Sadly, only a handful of phone makers jumped on this opportunity, and you probably haven’t even heard ofmany of the phones that added support right away(I’ve never even heard of iQOO before, for example). Big players like Samsung have decided to stick with their own system. We’ve repeatedly seen that OEMs and developers won’t do something just because Google asked nicely. Google needs to make this a mandatory inclusion as part of GMS or at the very least force manufacturers to allow customers to download it from the Play Store themselves.
Given that Personal Safety has end-to-end-encrypted backups (the information will be transferred when you restore a backup from your old phone to your new one), this would allow people to switch between different brands of Android phones seamlessly without having to set up their medical information again. This should be on the same level of importance as Google’s password manager syncing your logins, but sadly, Android is not in this position yet.
