Pixel 11 Pro’s ‘HiLight’ notifications missed its chance to be perfect

The Pixel 11 doesn’t carry much of a different look, and the only major hardware change happening on the exterior could be glossed over without a second thought. Pixel 11’s HiLight hides in the camera LED and acts like a notification light when your phone is turned over. But it isn’t what I expected.

In theory, Pixel 11 Pro’s HiLight is meant to act as a visual cue for some of the phone’s actions, whether that’s notifications or interactions with Gemini. When an incoming call comes in, the light shines with a color preset you decided on earlier for that contact. Or when Gemini answers your beckon, it glows with the Google-centric blues and reds that appear on the Google Home Speaker.

But that’s only a morsel of what Pixel Highlight needs to be.

Imagine getting an Instagram notification, and you see a small mosaic appear over the camera bar. Your HiLight LED glows with the orange, purple, and reds of the Instagram logo. The first thought you have is, “Instagram.” Or what about a Reddit notification? HiLight’s LED array can glow with a bright red and white that would immediately be recognized as a Reddit notification.

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I would love to have a feature that brings beautiful little light shows, even if they are limited to just the outline of a camera flash. The fact is that HiLight is capable of dynamic visual notifications in the same way Philips Hue can make your office look like Miami Beach.

It’s not impossible. Google has already confirmed Messages will take advantage of the new HiLight notifications “soon,” but refused to comment on whether more apps will take advantage.

The new rear light is lined with multicolor LEDs designed for exactly that sort of visual arrangement. The color blends work incredibly well with how light diffuses and dances with Gemini’s integration. But even call notifications are limited to a solid color block.

Google could have expanded the feature beyond simple colors for contacts, too. I’m surprised we’re not getting colored notifications for suspected spam or during an active Call Screening session. That’s exactly the type of reason I’d want to be able to identify who’s calling. If they’re a contact, I’ll likely answer. If it’s spam or I need to check screening results, the LED could let me know whether it’s worth it or not.

But Google locked the feature, in the state it’s in, to its AI assistant and calls. Not messages and calls. Just calls.

Why does it need to be limited at all? Most of us thought HiLight, or Pixel Glow, as it was known during early leaks, would be packaged and shipped as an evolved version of the LED notifications seen in phones spanning back to the LG G3, though not limited to it.

Google had the opportunity to build on that, and it’s clearly had plenty of intrigue because it’s different for Google, in the best way.

Who’s to say how HiLight expands in the next year? It replaces a temperature sensor that the company decided to pass on in favor of the glowing camera bar, but for a software-dependent tool, there seems to be a high ceiling on what HiLight can do. It just won’t, yet.

The Pixel 11, Pixel 11 Pro, Pixel 11 Pro XL, and Pixel 11 Pro Fold are available now from the Google store.