Google Lens showing up when selecting images in Android Pie Overview screen

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The biggest visual change in Android Pie is the revamped navigation gestures and Overview screen. Google completely changed the way we interact with the OS. The home screen is less important now as we can access the app drawer from anywhere. Another part of that Overview (a.k.a. Recent Apps) screen is the app previews. You can actually copy content from these previews without opening the app fully. Google is adding even more functionality to this feature.

In case you didn’t know, it’s possible to long-press on an app preview in the Android Pie Overview screen and select text or an image. This works even with apps that normally wouldn’t allow you to select the text/image. It’s an incredibly useful feature when multitasking between several apps. Google alluded to adding more functionality to this feature and we’re starting to see the first signs of that with Google Lens.

XDA Recognized Developer Quinny899 shared the screenshots above with us (thanks!). As you can see, when long-pressing an image from the Overview screen, Google Lens now shows up as an option. The other option, “Share,” was previously the only choice. When tapping the Google Lens option, Lens scans the image and returns any information it can find. Imagine browsing the web and seeing a product you want more information about. This feature has a lot of potential uses.

Google appears to be rolling this out as a server-side switch. Several of us have the same version number for Google Lens, Google app, Pixel Launcher, and Google Play Services, yet don’t see this option yet. Keep an eye out for this feature to slowly roll out to more devices.