Google is rolling out a series of updates aimed at making widgets more accessible and easier to discover within the Play Store. These changes will highlight standout widgets and bring greater visibility to the apps that offer them.
For Android users who enjoy enhancing their home screens with widgets, Google revealed on Monday that it’s launching three new features designed to streamline widget discovery. These include a specialized search filter just for widgets, new badges on app pages to indicate widget availability, and an editorial section that curates top-quality widgets.
“Discovering and understanding widgets has traditionally been a challenge, even for users who like them,” wrote Yinka Taiwo-Peters, a product manager at Google, in a post directed at app developers. “You’ve asked for improved ways for users to explore and make use of widgets—and we’re responding with new tools to do just that.”
One of the new additions is a “Widgets” filter, which will appear at the top of Play Store search results, helping users pinpoint which apps include widget functionality. In addition, each app’s detail page will feature a visible widget badge to confirm whether it includes any widgets. To go a step further, Google is launching a dedicated editorial space where collections of high-quality widgets will be highlighted, along with the apps that make them available. This is part of an effort to educate users on how widgets can enrich their Android experience.
While there’s no exact release date yet, Google has indicated that these enhancements will be coming soon to Google Play across Android smartphones, tablets, and foldable devices.
In addition to the updates on Android, Google has quietly introduced widget improvements for iOS users as well. The Gemini app on iPhones now supports lock screen widgets, making it easy to type a prompt, activate voice mode, access the mic or camera, or share a file or image directly from the lock screen.
