Google's Digital Wellbeing app is meant to help you monitor and, if you wish, limit the use of your Android device(s) in order to promote your digital and in turn physical and mental health.
A new feature in beta testing called Heads Up looks to more directly intervene for the sake of your physical wellbeing by triggering a notification if you are using your phone while walking. The depressing implications of a feature like being considered necessary aside, you should definitely think twice before relying on it (via Android Central).
- Phones with the best battery life in 2021
- TCL unveils new 20 Pro flagship phone — and teases its bizarre rollable
- Best mobile phone deals in April 2021
Curious to see what the feature would look like in action, I opted into the Digital Wellbeing beta on my Pixel 4XL. Digital Wellbeing isn't limited to Pixel phones, but not all Android phones can use it either. Samsung phones are most notably left out.
The beta version of the app immediately installed for me and I turned on Heads Up without issues. It requires that you grant it permission to track your activity. This is how it determines you are walking and you can optionally grant it location permissions as well. I granted both to be sure it had the best lock possible on my movement and headed off down the sidewalk while scrolling through Twitter.
Not once in ten blocks of walking while using my phone did I see a single notification from Heads Up. I then got out my Pixel 4a 5G and redid the same test in case it was somehow an issue with the Pixel 4XL, but again nothing.
I hope that people don't actually need this feature to help them avoid heading across a street with their head buried in their phone. Because it fails utterly at that task –– at least in its current beta. So for now, people will still need to be vigilant about their personal safety rather than putting the responsibility for their wellbeing on their phones.
