Google Phone 47 prepares to add “Flip to Silence” phone calls and answering with 1-way video

Google rolled out version 47.0 of the Google Phone app in the beta channel today, and a brief review of new resources in the APK revealed a few new features coming to the Pixel’s dialer app. These features are not live yet in the public beta release, but they could go live during the next Pixel Feature Drop.

An APK teardown can often predict features that may arrive in a future update of an application, but it is possible that any of the features we mention here may not make it in a future release. This is because these features are currently unimplemented in the live build and may be pulled at any time by the developers in a future build.

Answer with 1-way Video

One string suggests that the Google Phone app will let users answer incoming calls as 1-way video. This likely means you’ll be able to see the video from the other caller but they won’t be able to see your video feed.

<string name="call_incoming_chip_answer_video_as_one_way_video">Answer as 1-way video</string>

Flip to Silence

Another set of strings describes a new “Flip to Silence” feature. This feature will let users silence the ringtone from incoming phone calls by placing the phone face down on a flat surface.

<string name="flip_to_shush_title">Flip To Shhh</string>
<string name="flip_to_silence_key">flip_to_silence_key</string>
<string name="flip_to_silence_summary">To silence an incoming call, place your phone face down on a flat surface</string>
<string name="flip_to_silence_title">Flip To Silence</string>

Examining the decompiled code of the Google Phone app, we find that the app enables a link to Digital Wellbeing’s “Flip to Shhh” if that feature is available, otherwise, the new “Flip to Silence” toggle will be shown. This is because despite the fact that Flip to Shhh’s feature description states that it only turns on Do Not Disturb mode when you flip your phone, this action actually already silences the ringtone from incoming phone calls, at least it does on my Pixel 4. Hence, if “Flip to Shhh” is available, then “Flip to Silence” won’t need to be shown to the user. But if “Flip to Shhh” isn’t available, then “Flip to Silence” will need to be shown. Currently, Flip to Shhh is available on the Pixel 2, Pixel 3, Pixel 3a, and Pixel 4, while the Google Phone app is available on not only Pixel devices but also Android One devices. We do not know if Google plans on enabling “Flip to Silence” for non-Pixel devices, however.

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Thanks to PNF Software for providing us a license to use JEB Decompiler, a professional-grade reverse engineering tool for Android applications.

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