- Google Messages discontinues Nudges feature, leaving users without reply and birthday reminders.
- Users left wondering as Google offers no explanation for the removal of Nudges.
- Alternatives like Google Contacts and third-party apps step in to fill the void in message and birthday reminders.
Google has done something unexpected, their Google Messages app for Android stopped using the functionality “Nudges.” Introduced in 2022, nudges give users access to reply to an old message for follow-up and notify existing and upcoming birthdays to the user in their contact list.
Google Messages Discards Reply Nudges and Birthday Reminders
Nudges acted as a virtual assistant for text conversations, offering the following functionalities:
1. Reply Reminders: Nudges will send you a gentle reminder if you ever forget to reply to a given message. You just need to do it.
2. Birthday Reminders: Bye-bye, days when forgetting a birthday was no big deal! Utilizing contact information, nudges undertook to request users to send birthday wishes to their friends/family.
As of the most recent stable and beta version of Google Messages (20240429_01_RC00), Nudges are no longer found in Settings > Suggestions. Instead, Smart Reply, Suggestions (Attach recent photos, Create event, Start video call, Share location, or GIF search), Magic Compose, and Suggested Stickers are the only programs available there. On an Android landing page that was unveiled in late March, Google is still promoting the feature as of right now.
Google has yet to justify the decision to leave its loyal users there without a clear understanding of the cause of the problem. Others may see the issue as being the fact that these separate apps are not able to support features such as Assistant integration, since it was removed in 2023 from Messages.
By Google declaring the discontinuance of “Spotlights” but without any good alternative, the news may witness low-level popularity.
Despite the absence of Nudges, there are still options available to manage messages and birthdays:
1. Google Contacts: Users can easily use reminders within the Contacts app and daily or any type of general reminders, which makes them a part of our lives.
2. Third-Party Reminder Apps: Among diverse apps from third parties that are being used to have a one-stop messaging and birthday reminder.
These nudges being unavailable results in a functionality gap for now in Google Messages. Whether reminders may be present in a different way or not is uncertain, for now, the company relies on external integrations. We’ll keep an eye out for further developments.
