“OK Google” from any screen has finally returned to the Samsung Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge

There was a weird issue with the Samsung Galaxy S6 and Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge that completely broke the “OK Google” command when trying to use it outside of Google Now. Thankfully that command has returned thanks to a fix Google was able to cook up.

We still aren’t completely sure what the issue was, but we’re glad to know that early suspicions of Samsung disabling the feature were inaccurate. There are a few things you’ll need to know if you want it back:

• You need to be on the latest version of the Google Search app — version 4.5 — so be sure to double check.


• It doesn’t hurt to make sure you have the latest version of Google Play Services, which is 7.5.71.


• You can’t use Samsung’s S Voice hotword detection while using the OK Google command from anywhere, unless you are fine with using it only when the display is off. Users can disable S Voice hotword detection to avoid this conflict.

As long as those conditions are met and understood you should see the option reappear inside the Google Search app. We’d say not using S Voice for the sake of being able to use OK Google is a very decent trade-off since the general consensus is that Google Now is superior. Be sure to give it a try on your Galaxy S6 device if you’ve been missing the feature.

[via Google]