Google is redesigning the voice search button in its Android homescreen widget so a spoken query can be sent to AI Mode or Search Live instead of only a standard search, according to 9to5Google. A toolbar along the bottom edge, borrowed from Google Lens, holds those two options alongside ordinary Search and the Song Search shortcut that already existed. Until now the microphone only transcribed a query and ran a regular search. Search picks up a four-bar waveform with the transcription running along the top, and a finished AI Mode query can be sent with the next arrow or dropped into an editable search box. The app will remember which mode was used last and open in either Search or AI Mode. The redesign is showing up only in the Google app beta so far.
