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Bixby (software)

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Bixby
DeveloperSamsung Electronics
Initial release21 April 2017; 8 years ago (2017-04-21)
Stable release(s) [±]
Android3.5.44[1] Edit this on Wikidata / 22 July 2025
Android (Bixby Vision)3.8.22.3[2] Edit this on Wikidata / 28 August 2025
Windows6.10.17.0[3] Edit this on Wikidata / June 2025
Wear OS1.5.29.4[4] Edit this on Wikidata / 3 October 2025
Written inVarious, mostly JavaScript[5]
Operating systemAndroid, Tizen, Windows, Wear OS
PredecessorS Voice
Available in12 languages
List of languages
English (American, British, American-Canadian, British-Canadian & Indian), French, Korean, Mandarin (China & Hong Kong), German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese (Brazilian), Japanese (Japan), & Cantonese (Hong Kong)
TypeIntelligent personal assistant
Websitewww.samsung.com/us/apps/bixby/

Bixby (/ˈbɪksbi/ ⓘ) is a virtual assistant developed by Samsung Electronics[6] that runs on various Samsung-branded appliances, primarily mobile devices but also some refrigerators[7] televisions and PCs. It uses voice commands and a natural-language user interface to answer questions and perform tasks, while adapting to the users' preferences and behavior.[8][9]

Samsung first launched Bixby in 2017.[10] Along with Bixby voice assistant, its other main component currently is Bixby Vision, a contextual and visual search augmented reality[11] camera app.[12] Formerly, the Bixby suite consisted of a number of other tools but these have since been renamed, such as Bixby Routines (now Modes and Routines).[13]

History

[edit]
Bixby Home, the former information screen at launch of Bixby 1.0

On 20 March 2017, Samsung announced the voice-powered digital assistant named "Bixby" as a replacement of the S Voice assistant.[10][8][14][15] It was introduced alongside the Galaxy S8 and S8+ and the Galaxy Tab A (2017) during the Galaxy Unpacked 2017 event;[16][17][18] although released for these devices, it could also be sideloaded on older Galaxy devices running Android Nougat.[19] A while before the phone's release, the Bixby Button was reprogrammable and could be set to open other applications or assistants, such as Google Assistant. However, near the phone's release, this ability was removed with a firmware update, but can be remapped using third-party apps.[20]

Bixby in Korean was launched on 1 May 2017 (KST).[21] Bixby Voice was intended to be made available in the US later that spring,[22] however, the release of the English version was postponed as Samsung had problems getting Bixby to fully understand the language.[23] The English version was finally rolled out in July 2017[24] and later that year followed by a Chinese language version.[25]

In October 2017, Samsung announced the release of Bixby 2.0 during its annual developer conference in San Francisco. The new version was rolled out across the company's line of connected products, including smartphones, TVs, and refrigerators. Also, third parties are allowed to develop applications for Bixby using the Samsung Developer Kit.[26] Bixby 3.0 was released with One UI 3 at the start of 2021.[27] With version 3.0, Home and Reminders features were separated from Bixby.

In 2019, UX developers at Samsung said their intention to use the AR Emoji avatar as a personified Bixby assistant.[28]

In June 2021, screenshots surfaced for what some thought as a replacement for Bixby.[29] The three-dimensional virtual assistant, Sam, was popular on social media though it was not intended as a replacement for Bixby.[30][31]

Bixby launched for Microsoft Windows in October 2021 with distribution through the Microsoft Store. This version of Bixby is optimized for Samsung's Galaxy Book computers and may not function on non-Samsung systems.[32][33]

Samsung launched an AI Bixby custom voice creator in 2023 allowing users to record their own voice commands.[34][35]

Most recently, in July 2024, Samsung confirmed that it plans to launch an upgraded version of Bixby later this year. This new Bixby would be powered by Samsung's proprietary large language model (LLM) technology, promising a significant boost to Bixby's capabilities with the help of generative AI.[36][37]

In January 2025 with the announcement of Galaxy S25 and the One UI 7 update, Bixby is no longer the default voice assistant now replaced in role by Google Gemini. Despite this, Bixby still continues to be developed and expanded by Samsung, and was revamped at the same time with new AI capabilites.[38] Also, Samsung brought the "smarter" Bixby to Samsung televisions, allowing users to speak to their TV sets and also control their homes using it.[39]

A visual refresh planned for One UI 8.5.[40][40]

Functionality

[edit]
Bixby running in Windows 11 responding to a query

Bixby is a voice assistant that can get tailored information about the weather, reminders of meetings, news articles, and others using artificial intelligence. It can learn individual voices, so it can personalize its answers.[41]

Bixby itself was also formerly called Bixby Voice to differentiate from other Bixby tools in the suite.

Bixby Vision

[edit]
Bixby Vision icon since 2025

Bixby Vision is an augmented-reality camera that can identify objects in real-time and potentially offer the user to purchase them online, translate text, read QR codes, and recognize landmarks.[42]

It comes pre-installed on Samsung Galaxy phones. It is considered to be the imaging component of Bixby.[43]

Former Bixby tools

[edit]

Bixby Home was a vertically scrolling home screen with a list of information that Bixby could interact with, for example weather, fitness activity and buttons for controlling their smart home gadgets.[42] It was renamed "Samsung Daily" on One UI 2.1 released in 2020,[44] then in One UI 3.0 Samsung Daily itself was replaced by a new app called "Samsung Free" (some countries instead use the name "Samsung O"),[45] which has more recently been discontinued.[46][47] Samsung News is now its replacement and functions as a news aggregator with the option of home screen swipe integration similar to Bixby Home did.[47]

Bixby Routines is a feature that automates tasks by creating custom rules based on specific triggers, such as the time of day or the user's location. As of the release of One UI 5.0, the feature is now renamed to "Modes and Routines".[48]

Bixby Text Call is a handsfree call answer feature introduced with One UI 5.0 in 2022.[49] It is found in the settings of the Phone app.[50] It is now named simply "Text call".

Bixby Touch is a tool that makes recommendations based on intelligent recognition. The user can access services such as translation, online shopping, and media by touching the screen.

Bixby Global Action, Bixby Dictation and Bixby Wakeup are other older apps.[51]

Regions and languages

[edit]

As of April 2018, Bixby is available in over 195 countries, but only in Korean, English (American), and Chinese (Mandarin).[52] The limitation is that the models not intended for the Japanese market, like S10e, are not allowed to login to Bixby services from Japan; therefore Bixby becomes blocked. The choice of languages has since expanded: Samsung has deployed Bixby's voice command function in French,[53][54] and on 20 February 2019 Samsung announced the addition of further languages: English (British), German, Italian and Spanish (Spain).[55] On 22 February 2020, Samsung announced the addition of Portuguese (Brazil), for Galaxy S10 & Note10, in Beta, and later for other models.[56]

Compatible devices

[edit]

Flagship series

[edit]

Other series

[edit]
Galaxy A
Galaxy M
Galaxy F
Galaxy Tab A
Galaxy J
  • Galaxy J4 (2018) (Bixby Home)[59]
  • Galaxy J7+ (2017)[60]
  • Galaxy J6 (2018) (Bixby Vision, Bixby Home and Bixby Reminders)
  • Galaxy J6+ (2018)
Galaxy C
  • Galaxy C8 (Bixby Home, Reminder and Bixby Vision only)

Galaxy XCover

  • Galaxy XCover Pro

Laptops

[edit]

See also

[edit]

Notes

[edit]
  1. ^ Bixby Home, Reminder and Vision only available on Android Oreo; S Voice used instead

References

[edit]
  1. ^ "Bixby for Android".
  2. ^ "Bixby Vision for Android".
  3. ^ "Bixby for Microsoft Windows".
  4. ^ "Bixby for Wear OS".
  5. ^ Mark Tucker (26 October 2019). "Bixby Learnings from an Alexa Developer". Voicebot.ai. Retrieved 27 February 2022.
  6. ^ "Bixby". Samsung. Retrieved 7 November 2017.
  7. ^ Carman, Ashley (15 May 2017). "Samsung's Bixby assistant is coming to smart fridges". The Verge. Retrieved 20 May 2017.
  8. ^ a b Vincent, James (10 February 2017). "So, what is Samsung's Bixby AI assistant really made of?". The Verge. Retrieved 5 April 2017.
  9. ^ McGregor, Janhoi. "Samsung Has Made Bixby Actually Useful On The Galaxy S25". Forbes. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  10. ^ a b Scott Adam Gordon (10 February 2017). "Galaxy S8's Bixby assistant to be based on S-Voice, not Viv Labs tech". Android Authority. Retrieved 5 April 2017.
  11. ^ "Bixby : Samsung Virtual Assistant [ Full Guide ]". TTGADGET - Tips and Tutorials for Gadget. 23 March 2017. Archived from the original on 27 August 2017. Retrieved 5 April 2017.
  12. ^ SamMobile. "Bixby Vision". SamMobile. Retrieved 4 October 2023.
  13. ^ "What is Samsung Bixby & how to use the app service". Samsung uk. Retrieved 4 October 2023.
  14. ^ "Hi Galaxy, Samsung S Voice to be discontinued on June 1". GSMArena.com.
  15. ^ "Bixby : A New Way to Interact with Your Phone". SAMSUNG Newsroom. Retrieved 5 April 2018.
  16. ^ Pham, Sherisse (21 March 2018). "Samsung's new AI assistant will take on Siri and Alexa". CNNMoney. Retrieved 30 March 2018.
  17. ^ Baig, Edward (20 March 2017). "Samsung promises its Galaxy S8 Bixby assistant will be 'fundamentally different'". USA Today. Retrieved 30 March 2018.
  18. ^ "Everything Samsung announced at its Unpacked 2017 launch event". VentureBeat. 29 March 2018. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  19. ^ Schoon, Ben (3 April 2018). "Here's how to install Bixby and the Galaxy S8's new launcher on other Samsung devices". 9to5Google. Retrieved 4 April 2017.
  20. ^ Karner, Jen (29 March 2017). "What is Bixby and is it like Google Assistant?". Android Central. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  21. ^ Mu-Hyun, Cho (1 May 2017). "Samsung launches Galaxy S8 Bixby voice command in Korea". ZDNet. Retrieved 30 August 2018.
  22. ^ "Samsung Galaxy S8 hits launch snag with Bixby voice assistant". CNET. 11 April 2017. Retrieved 30 August 2018.
  23. ^ Whitwam, Ryan (31 May 2017). "WSJ: Samsung's English-language Bixby rollout delayed because English is hard". Android Police. Retrieved 30 August 2018.
  24. ^ "Samsung Expands Bixby Voice Capabilities in U.S. English". news.samsung.com. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
  25. ^ "Nǐ hǎo, Bixby is Now Available in Mandarin Chinese in Malaysia!". news.samsung.com. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
  26. ^ Heater, Brian. "Bixby 2.0 takes center stage at Samsung's Developer Conference". TechCrunch. Retrieved 7 November 2018.
  27. ^ B, Subin (2 December 2020). "Bixby Update Brings New UI, Samsung DeX Support, and More". Beebom. Retrieved 27 November 2023.
  28. ^ Naresh (15 July 2019). "Samsung intends to use AR Emoji in games and Bixby". SamMobile. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  29. ^ Finn, John (4 June 2021). "Samsung's Sam Explained: Is Sam A Bixby Replacement For Galaxy Phones?". ScreenRant. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  30. ^ Peters, Megan (1 June 2021). "Samsung's Alleged Anime Assistant Is Taking Over the Internet". Comicbook.com. CB. Retrieved 2 June 2021.
  31. ^ Finn, John (1 June 2021). "Samsung's Sam: Is The Virtual Mobile Assistant Real?". Screenrant.com. Screen Rant. Retrieved 2 June 2021.
  32. ^ "Galaxy Books Deliver Next-Level Mobile Computing Experiences With Windows 11". Samsung Newsroom.
  33. ^ Kasiya, Chifundo (7 December 2021). "Samsung Bixby Is Available for Windows: What You Need to Know". MUO. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  34. ^ Jowitt, Tom (23 February 2023). "Samsung Enhances Bixby Clone Voices | Silicon UK Tech News". Silicon UK. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  35. ^ "Bixby Voice Creator: A new AI app launched by Samsung". r2.community.samsung.com. 22 August 2023. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  36. ^ "Samsung confirms an AI-enhanced Bixby upgrade is coming in 2024". Android Authority. 11 July 2024. Retrieved 12 July 2024.
  37. ^ Kharpal, Arjun (10 July 2024). "Samsung to launch upgraded voice assistant Bixby this year with its own AI". CNBC. Retrieved 12 July 2024.
  38. ^ McGregor, Janhoi. "Bixby Has A Surprise New Role On The Samsung Galaxy S25". Forbes. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  39. ^ "Samsung's Bixby just did what Siri hasn't yet". PhoneArena.
  40. ^ a b "Samsung's not done with Bixby, at least for now". www.androidpolice.com. 13 October 2025. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  41. ^ "What is bixby in samsung a52?". Ask Sawal. Retrieved 12 December 2022.
  42. ^ a b Bohn, Dieter (29 March 2017). "Three things we know Samsung's new assistant can do on the Galaxy S8". The Verge. Retrieved 30 August 2018.
  43. ^ "Your Samsung Camera Has a Secret AI Assistant—Here's How to Use It". Lifewire. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  44. ^ Philip Berne (30 October 2019). "Samsung Daily replaces Bixby Home on Galaxy phones". Android Central. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  45. ^ Dolcourt, Jessica (29 March 2017). "Samsung Galaxy S8's Bixby assistant needs to grow up fast". CNET. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
  46. ^ Rao, Chethan (19 April 2023). "Samsung News replaces the virtually unknown Samsung Free app, now rolling out in the US". Android Police. Archived from the original on 20 September 2023. Retrieved 5 October 2023.
  47. ^ a b "Samsung News will replace Samsung Free". 14 August 2025.
  48. ^ Shaik, Asif Iqbal (29 November 2022). "Modes and Routines app gets updated with better sleep mode features". SamMobile. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  49. ^ Gray-Traverso, Zach (25 May 2023). "What is Bixby Text Call?". Android Police. Retrieved 4 October 2023.
  50. ^ Kew-Denniss, Zachary (7 September 2023). "A Bixby Text Call made me realize I was wrong about Pixel smart features". Android Police. Retrieved 4 November 2025.
  51. ^ Bosnjak, Dominik (18 August 2017). "Samsung's Bixby Services Now Hitting Galaxy S8s Worldwide". Android Headlines. Retrieved 5 November 2025.
  52. ^ Kharpal, Arjun (22 August 2017). "Samsung Bixby expands to over 200 countries in battle with Amazon Alexa, Apple Siri". CNBC. Retrieved 27 August 2017.
  53. ^ "Et la lumière fut : Bixby prend enfin en charge la langue française… en version bêta" (published 25 February 2019). 13 December 2018.
  54. ^ "Bixby est disponible en français sur le Galaxy Note 9, enfin !" (published 25 February 2019). 12 December 2018.
  55. ^ "Samsung Extends Global Reach of Bixby, Launches Support for New European Languages". Samsung US Newsroom. 20 February 2019. Retrieved 6 June 2019.
  56. ^ "Samsung Further Develops Bixby, Introducing a New Language and Setting a Foundation for Future Growth". news.samsung.com. Retrieved 15 February 2024.
  57. ^ Rutnik, Mitja (12 July 2017). "The Galaxy A7 (2017) features Bixby in South Korea". Android Authority. Retrieved 30 August 2018.
  58. ^ "User manual confirms Bixby for Samsung Galaxy Tab A 8.0 (2017)". GSMArena.com. Retrieved 30 August 2018.
  59. ^ "Buy Galaxy J4 J400FZDDKSA | Samsung Business Saudi Arabia". Samsung sa_en. Retrieved 18 February 2024.
  60. ^ "Samsung Galaxy J7+ Black: Price, Specs & Features | Philippines". Samsung ph. Retrieved 18 February 2024.
  61. ^ "Bixby now available for all Windows PCs - MSPoweruser". mspoweruser.com. 6 October 2021. Retrieved 8 November 2023.
Preceded by Bixby Succeeded by
None
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