7 ways Pixel Call Assist helps you manage and screen calls
General summary
Pixel Call Assist helps you manage phone calls with features like screening calls, waiting on hold, and transcribing calls. You can use Call Assist to identify unknown callers, declutter your call log, and navigate call menus with ease. If you don't want to talk, you can use Live Caption to read and respond to calls, or use Call Screen to have your phone answer calls for you.
Summaries were generated by Google AI. Generative AI is experimental.Bullet points
- Pixel Call Assist helps you manage and screen calls with features like Call Screen, Direct My Call, and Call Notes.
- Quickly identify unknown callers and declutter your call log with reverse phone number lookup and spam call filters.
- Navigate call menus with Direct My Call, letting you tap through options instead of listening to long lists.
- Hold for Me waits on hold for you, notifying you when someone's ready to speak.
- Call Notes automatically creates summaries of your calls, highlighting important details and creating full transcripts.
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If you’ve ever wished you had a personal assistant to handle your phone calls for you, you’re surely not alone — and Call Assist on Pixel can help with everything from screening calls to waiting on hold. We even recently updated the Pixel phone call interface so you have quick access to Call Assist like Call Notes, Direct my Call and Audio Emoji.
So whether it’s because you’re extremely busy or just hate talking on the phone, here are seven ways you can use Call Assist features to manage phone calls and even spend less time on the phone.
If you’re getting too many spam calls, try…
1. Quickly looking up mystery phone numbers
You can use reverse phone number lookup to quickly identify unknown callers and put a stop to their spam calls. Simply tap the phone icon, go to your call history and select the unknown number. Your Pixel1 will then search for information associated with that number so you can get a better idea of who might be trying to reach you.
2. Decluttering your call log
Robocalls and spam calls can flood your call log. Now you can declutter it with new filters in your Recents view. These new filters make it easy to quickly find missed calls, calls from contacts and even filter out spam calls entirely, so your call history isn’t totally overrun with random numbers.
If you’re making lots of calls, try…
3. Navigating call menus with Direct My Call
Tired of fumbling through automated phone menus? Direct My Call displays the menu options right on your screen, letting you navigate with a tap. No more listening to long lists of options — just tap and go!
4. Letting Hold for Me listen to hold music for you
Hold for Me2 waits on the line for you if you’ve been put on hold. When someone’s ready for you, Hold for Me will inform them you’re returning and notify you that they’re ready.
5. Skipping the follow-up call or text with Call Notes
Call Notes3 replaces the need to find a scrap of paper and pen to jot down important details — like dates, addresses, things you need to follow up on and the general topics you spoke about — from a phone call. It automatically creates summaries of your calls, highlighting what you need to know, and creates full transcripts so you can see the call in its entirety.
Call Notes was built using Gemini Nano and designed to handle the types of conversations that happen on phone calls, so it knows what to add to the note and what probably doesn’t need to be included — things like what time you need to be somewhere or the location of a meeting spot. To use Call Notes, just head to the Call Assist menu and turn it on. Then when you’re taking phone calls, you’ll see a button on your in-call screen that allows you to activate Call Notes for that conversation.
If you simply don’t want to talk, try…
6. Taking text-only calls with Live Caption
You can use Live Caption to “read” and respond to incoming phone calls — it’s an incredible accessibility feature for those who are D/deaf, hard of hearing or have partial hearing. From your Pixel’s accessibility settings, just turn on Live Caption and the next time you have an incoming phone call, you’ll get an option to use Live Caption for the call. A text box and keyboard will appear, and you’ll see the caller’s words written out. You’ll be able to type back to respond, as the app will read your input aloud to the caller. You can even head to Live Caption’s settings to select the voice that will read your texts out loud to callers4.
7. Using Call Screen’s suggested replies to respond in real time
Call Screen helps you find out who’s calling you and why. In your settings, you can choose whether Call Screen works automatically or manually.
Call Screen works manually by default — you just tap “Screen call” when a call comes through. If it’s someone in your contact list, you’ll have the option to use Call Screen to ask if the call is urgent by tapping on “Ask if urgent.” In both cases, you’ll see Call Screen transcribe the call live on your screen and give you the option to use replies to interact if you still don’t want to or can’t pick up. And if you have a Pixel 9 or Pixel 9 Pro, you can even turn on AI-powered suggested replies5 for a larger range of responses generated in real time based on what the caller is saying. You can review the audio or transcript after the call in your Recents tab.
If you choose to have Call Screen work automatically, it will answer suspicious looking calls for you and ask who’s calling and why. You’ll see a silent notification that says that screening is in progress, and you can tap on the notification to peek at the transcript as it’s generated to see if you actually do want to answer. If the call is determined to likely be spam, Call Screen will politely end the call. Non-spam calls will ring for you and you’ll get a summary of what the caller said, so you can decide if you want to take the call. If you still don’t want to pick up, you can tap on “Call me back,” and Call Screen will return to the call and ask the caller to try you later. And should you choose this later option, you can always use Call Screen again later — because it’s totally up to you how long you play phone tag.
