Google app mysteriously shows up on Android Auto

The latest Android Auto beta has randomly led to the Google app showing up, but its purpose is unclear.

Last week, Android Auto 14.1 started rolling out to users in beta and brings with it one of the first big changes in a while, support for playing select Android games on your car’s display. However, for one of our readers, the update also randomly unlocked support for the Google app on Android Auto.

The Google app shows up alongside other Android Auto apps and seems to function like a messaging app. Opening the app shows a notice that there are “no new messages during this drive,” just as you’d see in Google Messages, WhatsApp, and other messaging apps.

As it stands currently, this appears to either be a mistake or something that’s very early in the works. The app appeared with the current stable release, v16.11.37, on Android Auto 14.1, which is currently in beta. However, we couldn’t replicate this on our end.

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What could this app do? It’s hard to say anything for certain. There’s a good chance it’s somehow related to the upcoming (and imminent) Gemini expansion on Android Auto, but it could also be used for notifications already in the Google app for followed topics, perhaps being used for location-related topics. That doesn’t seem especially likely, but anything is possible. It still seems very possible this was simply a mistake on Google’s part.