At launch, the only spoken notifications available on the Pixel Buds Pro 2 are from messaging apps, but Google is planning to upgrade the alert experience with Gemini.
Google Assistant on Pixel Buds Pro lets you “hear incoming notifications” from any application. You can toggle apps on/off from the “Spoken notifications” settings page, and is useful for news alerts or reminders.
Gemini’s “Announce notifications on headphones” capability for Pixel Buds Pro 2 is just for messaging apps like Google Messages, WhatsApp, Messenger, and Instagram.
Pixel Buds Pro vs. Pro 2
Google says it’s currently “reworking the notifications experience from the ground up.” It’s starting with “streamlined spoken notifications focused on messages” at launch since those are the most important alerts for people.
This is a downgrade for existing Pixel Buds owners, with Google telling us that it will “continue to build on this and are deeply excited about the many different ways Gemini can enhance your overall notification experience for messaging and non-messaging apps when using Pixel Buds.”
Large language models are good at summarizing text, so the promise is there, especially on wearables lacking screens where brevity is helpful. Android Auto already does this, while Apple Intelligence will offer such a feature on iOS 18. It’s not hard to imagine Android offering a similar capability on phones sooner than later.
However, that future promise does not make for a great day one experience. This is on top of Google removing touch-and-hold on existing buds for a readout of notifications. That gesture for hearing alerts isn’t available on Pixel Buds Pro 2 with “Hey Google, do I have any notifications” required instead.
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