Gmail-inspired superior filtering choices for contacts could be a boon

Contacts was one of many first Google apps to get a Materials You redesign, again in July 2021. Android 13 doesn’t pack as many visible adjustments as final 12 months’s launch, so Google builders appear to have pivoted their focus in the direction of ease of use and homogeneity throughout the corporate’s app choices. We’re seeing proof for that now in Google Contacts, with the introduction of filters to assist discover the folks you are trying for extra simply.

Final 12 months, Google gave Gmail some easy-to-access search filters for its Android app, dubbed chips. Providing the identical type of performance because the superior search filters on desktop, chips allow you to kind your mail based mostly on the sender, recipient, date, the presence of attachments, and much extra. And now that very same type of overhaul is going on for Google Contacts.

In a screenshot of the app, you may see the brand new chips beneath the search bar. Some are prepared that can assist you discover contacts based mostly on how you’ve got been in contact with these folks. Such a instrument might turn out to be useful if you happen to aren’t positive of the contact title, however you bear in mind e-mailing them or calling them up on the telephone earlier.

We additionally see a chip for filtering contacts by firm. This could possibly be an important asset, particularly if you happen to bear in mind the place somebody you’ve got been speaking to works, however can not recall their title. We are able to additionally see it being an important instrument for discovering all of your work colleagues in a single place.

Thus far, these chips appear to be in restricted testing. Whereas we’re not seeing them on Contacts model 3.74.21.466997988, different customers are, so it is possible we’re taking a look at an A/B check proper now, or perhaps the early days of a gradual server-side characteristic rollout. We’ll submit an replace for you if we study anything.

Thanks: Mishaal, Moshe