For Samsung devices running Android, users will not experience the new Talkback feature, which uses Gemini to describe images for the visually impaired.

What is TalkBack? What's special about the new update to this service and why can't Samsung users experience it?

To make the Android operating system more accessible to people with vision problems, Google created TalkBack, a screen reading service. Recently, Google announced an update to TalkBack, leveraging the Gemini AI model so that the service can generate descriptions for images displayed on the screen. However, Google did not mention in its announcement that this feature would not be available on all Android devices, specifically Samsung devices.

TalkBack is part of the Android Accessibility Suite application, which comes pre-installed on most Android devices that come with Google Mobile Services (GMS). However, Android Authority reports that it does not come pre-installed on Samsung Galaxy devices running One UI, Samsung's own custom interface. That's because Samsung uses a custom version of TalkBack built into its own accessibility toolkit, rather than Google's version of TalkBack included in the Android Accessibility Suite. While the two versions are similar in many ways, Samsung is responsible for updating and developing them entirely.

This means that the latest TalkBack update with Google's Gemini AI-powered image description feature will not work on Samsung devices, at least for now. Users of other Android devices running version 11 or later will benefit from the feature, especially on the Google Pixel 9, where TalkBack will leverage Gemini Nano to generate image descriptions on the device.

It's unclear whether Samsung plans to update its own TalkBack to include a feature similar to that of Google. If Samsung does intend to add the Gemini AI description generation feature, it will likely announce it at SDC 2024, where Samsung is expected to introduce the next version of One UI.