AI is the buzzword of 2025, with artificial intelligence seemingly making its way into every part of our digital lives – and smartphone manufacturers are capitalising on the interest.
Whether it’s Apple’s Apple Intelligence, Samsung’s Galaxy AI or the smattering of unbranded AI tools available on most Android phones in 2025, there’s no shortage of AI smarts available.
However, Google has been at this game for much longer than any of the competition, and the quality of its AI tools represents this perfectly.
In fact, with the release of the Pixel 10 and a range of new AI features, Google has proved that it’s still leagues ahead of any other smartphone manufacturer when it comes to genuinely helpful AI tools.
Apple Intelligence isn’t all that intelligent
For all the hype that Apple generated at WWDC 2024 with the reveal of Apple Intelligence, it has kinda fallen flat.
The rollout wasn’t great. It didn’t launch with the iPhone 16 despite being a marketed feature of the collection, and when it did roll out, it only included a handful of tools and was exclusive to the US.
Other features rolled out over the next few months, and availability widened. Still, the biggest features of Apple Intelligence – like a personalised Siri experience – are yet to materialise as of August 2025, and it might not make its debut until Spring 2026.
Even without the personalised Siri experience, Apple Intelligence feels half-baked. Sure, it ticks off the main boxes with elements like object removal in images, transcribing calls and recordings and even integration with ChatGPT for generating images and general knowledge queries – but the performance is hit-and-miss.
We’ve all seen those comparisons between Apple and Samsung’s image editing tools, and it’s clear that the Android competition has the upper hand here. Even relatively simple aspects, like transcription, are much more inaccurate on iOS in my personal experience.
Sure, upcoming features like live translation in messages, calls and FaceTime, voicemail summaries and Visual Intelligence support for screenshots coming with iOS 26 should elevate the offering, but it’s still not quite as well-rounded as what Android alternatives offer.
Galaxy AI features are already starting to dry up
Aside from Google’s suite of AI tools, it’s Samsung’s Galaxy AI that offers the most comprehensive set of AI features and functionality for Android users, encompassing nearly every aspect of the One UI experience.
That includes elements like writing tools, a range of image editing features – including the ability to remove, move, and even doodle new elements into existing images using GenAI with impressive results – as well as handy elements like real-time translation in calls, transcription functionality and the Now Brief summary.
But even then, after the initial barrage of AI features we saw introduced in 2024, new features are slow to materialise.
We saw smaller elements like the aforementioned Now Brief and updates to existing tech introduced with the Galaxy S25 collection, and the Z Fold 7 saw dual-screen AI multitasking with suggested app pairings and layouts for multitasking on the big internal screen, but those aren’t exactly big-hitting features.
That is why Google’s collection of AI tools is so impressive and wide-ranging.
Google has not only been at the AI game for much longer than the competition, but it continues to add genuinely useful tools every single year – and the Pixel 10 collection introduces some of the best yet.
Take the Pixel 2, for example. Despite launching back in 2017, at a time when tech like ChatGPT hadn’t even made its debut, it featured AI-powered functionality including Now Playing, an on-device AI that automatically recognised music playing nearby and displayed info on your lock screen and AI-powered Google Lens support, while Samsung’s equivalent Galaxy S8 and Apple’s iPhone 8 offered nothing of the sort.
That momentum has continued for years, with Google continually adding to its growing list of AI-powered features and functionality with no signs of slowing down or stopping. It’s what has helped the Pixel brand stand out for years – the small, genuinely smart and helpful features that really perfect the Android experience.
And, in a year where AI has seemingly been injected into every bit of tech we own, Google’s Pixel 10 AI smarts still manage to stand out. Why? Simply put, nobody else is doing anything close.
Take Magic Cue, for example. The AI-powered feature aims to provide you with contextual information whenever you need it. Google explains that the AI searches elements like apps, emails, screenshots, notes and more, and provides this information intelligently.
It provided the example that if you were calling a business, it’d search for details like the address, order ID, time of appointment or whatever else is deemed relevant for the call, and provide this in a floating overlay window in the phone app.
It can also surface recommendations in the Messages app, with Google claiming that a chat with a friend about restaurant recommendations would prompt the AI to pull up suggestions from Google Search or Maps search history and show them as a suggested reply.
This is a genuinely useful feature that’ll stop you swiping between multiple apps to gather information – in theory, anyway.
There’s also Camera Coach, a new AI-powered feature that’ll actively give you suggestions on framing and composition when you’re taking photos to make sure you get the best shot possible. I’m not talking about small nudges to go left or right either; it’ll suggest entirely new angles to give your shots that professional look.
And those are only two of the many features coming with the Pixel 10. There’s also enhanced Gemini Live smarts with the ability for the AI to add visual overlays in its live video mode to help direct you, as well as Guided Frame that describes what’s seen – perfect for low-sighted or blind people.
There’s also Ask Photos, which essentially allows you to describe the edits you’d like in plain language and get Gemini to apply them on your behalf. It’ll even translate calls in real time and use your own voice to do so, making for a much more personal experience than anything offered by the competition.
These aren’t AI features for the sake of it; they’re genuinely helpful features that should actually make a difference to the day-to-day use of the Pixel 10. And I don’t think I can say that about any of the other AI tools in smartphones in 2025.
