On the Google Pixel feature drop of December, the Pixel 8 Pro got the power of Gemini Nano. It’s the smallest AI model that Google has to offer, and it can run locally on smartphones. The model doesn’t even need power-hungry SoCs. All that makes it perfect for on-device AI tasks.
However, while Google Pixel 8 and 8 Pro have the same SoC, the non-Pro smartphone has now been confirmed to not have Gemini Nano. Google revealed this at the #TheAndroidShow, where the company talked about a large number of topics, including Android 15, MWC, and AI models.
Why Won’t Google Pixel 8 Get Gemini Nano?
During the Q&A portion of #TheAndroidShow, Terence Zhang, a Google engineer, talked about the reason behind the Pixel 8 not getting Gemini Nano. According to Zhang, it’s “because of some hardware limitations.” But, as mentioned earlier, both the non-Pro and Pro variants share the same SoC, the Tensor G3.
Well, it’s mostly about the RAM. As you may know, the Google Pixel 8 has 8 GB of memory, while the 8 Pro has 12 GB. But, again, we’ve already seen Gemini Nano work on the Galaxy S24 that comes with 8 GB of RAM. And it works flawlessly with on-device Magic Compose.
But, in that case, you need to understand that the Galaxy S24 comes with a powerful SoC. The entire new Galaxy series packs the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. So, even though the Google Pixel 8 may have the power to run Gemini Nano, Google doesn’t want it to impact the rest of the user experience.
Gizchina News of the week
In case you’ve missed it, Gemini Nano powers the Gboard Smart Reply in social media apps and the summarizing feature on the Google Pixel 8 Pro. While the non-Pro model is confirmed to get these, Google did say that it’s working to make it available to more devices. To be exact, it will be coming to “high-end devices in the near future.”
What is Gemini Nano?
Gemini Nano is the smallest and most efficient version of a new family of AI models developed by Google DeepMind. Unlike previous AI models, Gemini Nano can be run on your smartphone. That is, it doesn’t need to send information to the cloud. This makes it ideal for tasks that require privacy or that need to function offline.
Here are some of the benefits of having Gemini Nano on your device:
- Local processing of sensitive data: Because Gemini Nano runs on your phone, it can process information without ever sending it to Google’s servers. This is especially important for apps that handle sensitive data. Take the banking apps or messaging apps with end-to-end encryption on the Google Pixel 8 Pro, for example.
- Offline access: Even without an internet connection, you can still use features powered by Gemini Nano. This is useful for situations where your Google Pixel 8 Pro or other support devices have limited or no data access.
- Cost savings: Running AI models on the cloud can be expensive. By using Gemini Nano on your device, developers can save on these costs. This also has an impact on the customer side. As you may know, the AI features of the new Samsung Galaxy devices won’t stay free for long. But with lower costs at the developers’ end, the costs at the customers’ end should also be low.
