Samsung’s Galaxy S10 now lets you remap the Bixby key to another app

Image: zlata ivleva/mashable

Since the Galaxy S8, Samsung has included a physical button to activate its Bixby digital assistant on its flagship phones.

And for just as long, Samsung users have been asking for a way to program the button to do something else — something they’ll actually use — like launch another app or activate a smarter digital assistant such as the Google Assistant. 

Now, with the introduction of the Galaxy S10 family, Samsung finally caved to the request — sort of. 

Ahead of the S10’s global release on March 8, Samsung’s updated phone review units (including ours) with a new setting that lets you change the function of the Bixby button.

Prior to the update, a single press on the Bixby button would activate Samsung’s digital assistant. However, after the update, if you hop into the settings app and then into the “Advanced features” section, you’ll find a new setting within the “Bixby key” menu to program the physical button.

Users are given the options to program the Bixby button to open another app or command shortcut with a double press. Alternatively, you can program the key to open Bixby with a double press and another app or shortcut with a single-press.

But here’s the catch: Unfortunately, users will not be able to program the Bixby key to open the Google Assistant in place of Samsung’s crappy voice assistant. 

Trust us, we tried and the Assistant doesn’t show up as an option. Every other app can be mapped to the Bixby key, but not the Google Assistant.

It makes sense Samsung wants users to use Bixby instead of a competing digital assistant. And Bixby has improved quite a bit since its introduction in 2017, but it’s still nowhere near as intelligent or reliable as Google’s Assistant.

We’ve reached to Samsung to get an official answer on why they’re snubbing the Google Assistant and will update this story if we receive a response.

Still, Samsung’s at least listening to its users. For now, you’ll at least be able to map the key to open another app, like Instagram or Twitter, as you can with a BlackBerry’s “convenience button.” Maybe Samsung will come around to the Assistant… eventually.