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Ask button Google Photos

Credit: Adamya Sharma / Android Authority
TL;DR

  • Google is testing a new dedicated toggle to switch between the AI-powered “Ask Photos” and the classic search experience.
  • This new toggle will improve discoverability compared to the current double-tap shortcut for switching between the two search experiences.
  • If a classic search yields no results, Google Photos will automatically use “Ask Photos” to help find your media.

Google Photos is great at what it does…for the most part. A lot of Google’s changes to the app are well-intentioned, but sometimes, users prefer the older way of doing things. One such change is Ask Photos, an AI-powered search feature intended to help people find content with natural language queries. Most users prefer the classic search experience in Google Photos, but many don’t realize they can double-tap the “Ask” button to switch to it. Google could soon improve the situation by giving users one more toggle to switch between the two search experiences.

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Within Google Photos 7.61.0.860908034, we spotted code that enables another option to toggle between the classic in-app search experience and the Ask Photos search experience. We managed to enable the toggle and other new UI bits to give you an early look.