November's Pixel Drop brings AI-made widgets, a Gemini that makes calls and upgrades for older Pixels

Google's November Pixel Drop is rolling out now, a month earlier than usual, just as it did last year. It arrives together with Android 17 QPR2, and most of it is about Gemini. Here's what's new, sorted by which phones get it.

Pixel 11

• Gemini Call Screen replaces the old manual Call Screen. Gemini answers unknown callers on request and talks to them more conversationally than before.
• Pixel Solver, in the Google Calculator app, adds generative AI templates and lets you work through multi-step problems by typing prompts.
• HiLight, on the Pixel 11 Pro, Pro XL and Pro Fold, now lights up for Google Messages notifications too. At launch it only worked for phone calls and Gemini.

Pixel 11 and Pixel 10

• Create My Widget builds custom home screen widgets from a plain-language description, such as a sports score widget or a countdown to an event. The feature debuted on Googlebooks.

Pixel 10 series

• Gemini Intelligence comes to the Pixel 10, 10 Pro, 10 Pro XL and 10 Pro Fold. Its headline feature, Rambler, strips filler words out of voice transcriptions and formats them.
• Gemini app automation can handle tasks like ordering groceries, booking rides and meal delivery, marketplace purchases and reservations.
• Proactive Gemini Actions can, for example, add groceries mentioned in a conversation straight to a Google Keep list.
• Calls on your behalf: in the US, Gemini can now phone a business for you to change a reservation, put an item on hold or check inventory. This had been in beta since September.

Pixel 6 and newer

• 10 new Custom Icon styles, now generated with Nano Banana for better quality (Pixel 6a and newer).
• Unit Conversion in the Calculator app, with inline math, mixed-unit input and live exchange rates (Pixel 6a and newer).
• Pixel Search, a natural-language search bar at the top of the app drawer that looks across apps, the web, settings and your own content (Pixel 6 and newer).

Also this month

The Android 17 QPR2 update itself brings 33 Pixel bug fixes, and a separate Pixel Watch drop adds Create My Widget, phone-to-watch unlocking and Wear OS 7.1.

How to get it

Updates roll out in stages, so they may take days or weeks to reach every phone. To check manually, go to Settings > System > Software updates.