What you need to know
- Google previously announced a set of interactive wallpapers at Google I/O.
- These included Emoji, Cinematic, and generative AI-based wallpapers.
- The latest Android 14 beta now showcases Emoji Wallpapers for some beta testers.
- Emoji and Cinematic Wallpapers are expected to arrive on Pixel smartphones this month.
Some Pixel users on the Android 14 beta have noticed the new interactive Emoji Wallpapers appearing on their devices.
At Google I/O last month, Dave Burke, VP of Engineering at Google, talked about new interactive wallpapers for Android 14. According to Mishaal Rahman, Google is rolling out an update to the Emoji Wallpaper app in the Android 14 beta 3 update that rolled out to Pixel devices, including Pixel 7a, early this week.
The app is dubbed “Emoji Workshop Wallpaper” and supposedly showed up on Google Play Store (through this link) only for the latest beta testers on Pixel smartphones.
According to multiple users, Google is rolling out an update to the Emoji Wallpaper app in Android 14 Beta 3. The update shows up on Google Play as “Emoji Workshop Wallpaper” and enables you to use the emoji wallpaper feature in Wallpaper & styles.Credits: @Google_nws pic.twitter.com/aHtB1RUxs4June 8, 2023
In the Pixel’s Wallpaper & style setting, this shows up as Emoji Workshop, which is where these interactive wallpapers will seemingly reside when they move out of beta.
Beta users who received the update can now create stylized wallpapers using a combination of emoji, as Burke showcased at Google I/O. When the wallpaper is set, tapping on it will cause the emoji to move, and there are other various animations that occur when performing various actions on your phone (per Android Police).
For now, not everyone seems to have access to the Emoji Wallpaper, and so far, it hasn’t appeared on any of our Pixel smartphones running the Android 14 beta.
While the feature appeared within the Android 14 beta, Burke announced during I/O that it would roll out this month on Pixel smartphones “first,” meaning we can probably expect the feature to arrive for more users with the seemingly delayed June 2023 feature drop. It also suggests other Android phones may receive the feature down the line.
Other features shown off at Google I/O 2023 include Cinematic Wallpapers and generative AI wallpapers, the latter of which is expected this fall, likely coinciding with the Android 14 update.
