Google really wants you to fall in love with Google Duo as they continue to add more features to the audio and video chat app. They are now testing out two new features that should make it more attractive to current users and hopefully get new users on board. These new features are call reminders and calling Google Home devices through the Duo app directly. The features are not yet available in the latest update but were only spotted in a teardown and enabled by some developers for testing.
According to the folks over at XDA Developers, the call reminder feature was first spotted by 9 to 5 Google in a teardown and then enabled by reliable tipster Jane Manchun Wong. When you tap on a contact’s name, a window pops up with “Set a reminder to call later”. Tap on create and it will show a window with options when you want to be reminded to call that person later that day, tomorrow, or you can pick a date and time.
The other new feature lets you make calls from your Google Duo app to your Google Home devices. While you can already make calls to your smart speakers using your Google Assistant, you now have a button at the top of your contact list on Duo to make it easier.
However, it doesn’t seem to be working for all Google Home devices right now, probably it’s because they’re still in the testing stage. But it can be a useful feature especially since landline phones aren’t that popular anymore so calling a smart speaker will become more convenient right now.
As to when these two features will eventually roll out, we have no idea at this point. There’s also a possibility that if the testing doesn’t go well, they might not even launch them at all.
