Google Boosts Android’s Second Favorite Weather App Just in Time for Pixel 9

The truth is, Android has never had a weather app that users want to check first. For Google, this is especially annoying because, as the world’s search giant, its weather app should be the only app you turn to for accurate, aggregated data. The situation became desperate in 2020 when Apple bought Dark Sky and took it behind its own walled garden. Now, iPhone users have their favorite weather app on Android and a native app that has its own status.

There’s good news on the horizon for Android users who are yearning for something better. Code detectives at 9 to 5 google And Android Authority They’re raving about a whole new weather app coming to the Pixel experience. In a leaked APK, you can carry yourself aside (Taking into account that this is pre-release software and it’s all up to your discretion), we get a glimpse of what’s new with Google’s default weather app.

The Pixel weather app will get a late material revamp. The various dashboards will be designed in the same vein as the latest Pixel widgets. There are more rounded corners, more prominent icons, and easier-to-look-at data, and the sunrise and sunset widget is more visually logical than it was before.

Unfortunately, Froggy doesn’t appear in this release. Google’s weather frog has appeared in numerous Google Doodles throughout the ecosystem’s lifetime and appears to have been officially discontinued. Maybe it’s time for Froggy to find a lily pad where he’s not the main character of Android users’ second-choice weather app. I’d be ready to retire if I was dealing with years of this kind of rejection, too.

Google’s Pixel weather app will adopt the color scheme you’re using on your device, whether it’s dark or light. It will also ask for notification permissions to periodically send you forecasts for your current location. This appears to be similar to how it’s currently displayed on the home screen using the At a Glance widget in the Pixel Launcher. There’s also Reports On X/Twitter/Whatever for a weather map, which seems like it would be useful for a place like the San Francisco Bay Area, where there are microclimates and you can’t leave the house without being prepared for the weather an hour away. However, I couldn’t find a feature like this with the APK installed on my Pixel 8.

We’ll soon find out what’s special about the revamped Weather app, and some of its AI improvements may not have been revealed yet. Google’s Made by Google event is on August 13, which is when we expect to hear everything new with the Pixel 9 and the rest of the device family.

There are still plenty of third-party weather apps available to use. Weather Live is my go-to app for its hour-by-hour forecast and wind direction since it was free with Google Play Pass. But if Google’s forecasts are accurate enough, I’ll probably find myself ditching that app for a native one.