11 low-key but useful details in Android 9.0 Pie

Android 9.0 Pie was officially released a few days ago, bringing a new user interface, gesture navigation, and more importantly, the introduction of artificial intelligence to intelligently manage your phone. In previous reports, we have introduced the top ten major new features including adaptive battery, and today we will take a look at those relatively low-key but very practical new features of Android 9.0 Pie.

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Bluetooth Speaker Party

Android 9.0 Pie allows users to pair up to 5 Bluetooth devices and switch seamlessly between them. If there is an incoming call, Google said Android P will automatically route it to any Bluetooth speaker or paired audio accessory that can handle the call. Android Oreo currently only supports up to 2 Bluetooth audio connections.

Android Pie will remember audio preferences for each Bluetooth device

In our daily lives, we often encounter such a situation: when connecting wireless headphones or car stereos, the volume set on the phone is too loud. In Android 9.0 Pie, the volume of each Bluetooth device is automatically memorized.

The screen rotation button is only displayed when the user needs it.

It can be confusing, but it's a really nice feature, and if you're used to turning off Android's auto-rotation feature, the addition of a touch-sensitive button in Pie is a nice touch.

In Pie, when an app that supports landscape mode is opened and the screen is rotated, users will see a new rotation lock icon in the rightmost navigation bar. Clicking it will rotate the app, but it will not change the entire system settings. When you click this icon, you can lock the app in landscape mode.

Easily see which apps have sent you notifications recently, and which ones bother you most often.

Is there an app that often bothers you and sends useless notifications? Even if the user does not deal with it immediately, the Android Pie system can easily check which apps have recently bothered you and stop sending them again.

Go to Settings -> Apps & Notifications, tap "Notifications" near the bottom, and the screen that pops up will show the most recent notifications. If you select "View all notifications from the last 7 days", you can filter by frequency instead of chronological order.

Android Pie suggests turning off frequently dismissed notifications

If Android 9.0 notices that users often close notifications sent by apps without clicking on them, the system will display a prompt asking whether to close notifications for that particular program, so users don't need to swipe to close them again and again.

New and more practical Accessibility Menu

Google has equipped Pie with a new Accessibility Menu, which gets its own icon on the bottom navigation bar after activation. The Accessibility Menu provides more accessible shortcuts (and larger tap targets) to perform functions such as triggering Google Assistant, opening the app drawer, pulling down quick settings, notifications, screenshots, and more.

Lockdown mode temporarily blocks fingerprint and facial recognition on the lock screen

On Pixel devices, a new screenshot feature appears when you long press the power button. However, there is a new security feature that is turned off by default. The button is called Lockdown mode.

After clicking on the activation button, the user will leave the lock screen interface, hide all notifications, and need a password or graphic interface to unlock the device. In addition, facial recognition and fingerprint recognition are not available. To enable it, you need to go to Settings —> Security & location —> Lock screen preferences and click the "Show lockdown option" option.

If no device is connected to the mobile hotspot, it will automatically turn off

This is a pretty simple and useful battery saving measure: if you have a WiFi hotspot enabled in Android Pie, there is a new setting that will automatically turn off the hotspot when it detects that there are no devices connected. This setting is activated by default. If you personally prefer to turn this feature off, you can set it in the hotspot page.

Finally there is a magnifying glass function when highlighting text

When you perform copy and paste tasks, you can see the magnifying glass function that will follow your filter.

New feature reduces audio latency issues on wireless headphones

In Android 9 Pie, Google added "sound delay reporting" technology, which can greatly eliminate audio delays on wireless headphones. However, this technology requires the cooperation of headphone manufacturers.

Ambient Display can show weather and battery level

Last but not least, the Ambient Display on the Google Pixel 2 shows the weather conditions/temperature as well as the battery level. So you have two less reasons to turn on the screen.