Google's Circle to Search now works on music... and on a Samsung Galaxy S23, no less

Music identification could be about to get a boost across your Android devices thanks to a new feature coming to Circle to Search. The new evolution could send existing song recognition services to the recycle bin.

Google has long been able to identify music. One of the features of Pixel devices has been Now Playing, which will identify music in the background and show it on your lockscreen - as well as logging tunes that you hear during the day.

But that's not all Google offers. On the Google Search bar widget on phones there's a microphone. This will let you use voice search, but tap it and at the bottom of the screen is the option to identify songs. That will let you identify real music, as well as something you want to sing or hum.

It now looks as though that identification process is making a hop over to Circle to Search. Circle to Search made its debut on the Samsung Galaxy S24 when it launched and then soon came to Pixel phones and interestingly, the first device it has been spotted on is the 2023 Samsung Galaxy S23, via a user on Reddit.

When you activate Circle to Search, there will be a note icon between the search bar and translation icon, which you can tap to identify music. This then works in a similar way to the existing method through Google voice search.

The advantage that Circle to Search has over the Search widget, is that you can access Circle to Search at any time and it opens over other apps. That means you could be doing something else and then instantly access it, rather than heading back to the homescreen before starting the process.

That's going to make it a fast and instant process, so you won't miss that song that's playing.

When will Now Playing come to Circle to Search?

Currently that remains unknown. Google hasn’t announced the new feature. I've looked for it on the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra and on the Pixel (with the same app version as the original source reported) and it's not there - meaning that this is a limited roll-out.

It's a little surprising that it has landed on an older phone first, but it's likely that it's still being tested before getting a wider push. Google is likely to announce the feature along with other additions to devices in the coming weeks.