The quarterly Pixel Function Drops are top-of-the-line components of proudly owning a Pixel cellphone.
Whereas they don’t seem to be at all times filled with helpful updates, realizing there’s one thing new arriving like clockwork each three months retains us engaged with our Pixel telephones.
March’s Pixel Function Drop was particularly good, bringing updates to Now Taking part in, Circle to Search, and app icons.
It is the app icon improve that caught my eye when studying the replace notes. I’ve by no means been fairly pleased with how Android handles native app icon customization.
Themed Icons sounded enjoyable in concept, however turned your private home display screen right into a complicated minimalist mess in actuality. App icon shapes had been a neat improve, however the entire package deal felt restricted in comparison with the number of third-party app icon packs on the market.
Nevertheless, these icon packs have a extreme downside; they cannot present a customized icon for each app on the Play Retailer. Google has lastly solved this downside, and you may in all probability guess how.
I’ve had sufficient — Google nonetheless has these 5 Pixel issues to kind out in 2026
My Pixel want record for 2026
The pure evolution of Themed Icons
A historical past of attempting to make our dwelling screens look good
Themed Icons had a easy premise after they launched alongside Android 12 in 2021.
Google offered customized monochrome icons for a few of its first-party apps, which your Pixel cellphone may colour in to suit your cellphone’s theme.
All of it match into the Materials You redesign, which aimed to create a cohesive visible identification on your cellphone. Choose a colour palette, and your Pixel would colour in UI components and suitable app icons to match.
Nevertheless, the system solely actually works when most of your apps match with the theming, so Google made it potential for third-party builders to create their very own themed icons in Android 13.
These efforts got here to a head with Android 16, when Google pressured builders to agree to permit our telephones to use a monochromatic theme to all app icons.
So, as of 2025, you’ll be able to have a Pixel cellphone with a totally unified colour scheme. The issue? It is boring at greatest and complicated at worst.
I attempted utilizing Themed Icons once more after Google pressured it on all apps, however I could not get alongside. Whereas figuring out apps wasn’t a significant downside (I have a tendency solely to have a number of apps on my dwelling display screen at anyone time), I hated how flat my dwelling display screen appeared.
So after experimenting with the characteristic, I disabled it in favor of the app icons the builders wished us to make use of.
However there was one other downside. Themed Icons didn’t lengthen to the app drawer. Switching from themed icons to the unique icons was jarring and went towards the very motive Themed Icons exist.
So now, in 2026, with a supercharged Themed Icons characteristic, are issues any higher? No, the truth is, they’re worse.
New customized icons seem to be an amazing concept at first
A repair to the generic Themed Icons characteristic?
In concept, the brand new customized icon characteristic looks like it solves all my issues.
If you have not tried it out but, Google now offers a set of adjustable presets for icon customization. They’re powered by AI, so you’ll be able to select a theme, and it’ll robotically apply.
Listed here are a number of examples of this characteristic in motion.
Let’s speak concerning the good first. This characteristic did a powerful job of customizing the third-party apps on my cellphone. There have been a number of exceptions, however these weren’t important sufficient to fret about.
A number of the results had been wonderful (the first colour setting for the Easel theme works significantly nicely), and those who did not had been largely resulting from them clashing with my wallpaper of alternative.
However herein lies the issue. The place Themed Icons nearly blended too nicely with my Pixel cellphone’s UI, these AI icons conflict greater than the originals ever did.
It is a mess, except you need to put in critical work
The primary difficulty with AI-generated icons is theming.
Whereas I do not anticipate the extra chaotic types like Cookie to match my cellphone’s wallpaper and UI, easier themes like Treasure are simple to theme round.
If I need a coherent theme, I’ve to pick out an identical wallpaper by eye, then toggle by way of the theming choices to discover a palette that applies the appropriate colour to the UI components.
I’ve by no means been significantly annoyed by the randomness of Materials You’s theming earlier than, however that modified when attempting to make it match the AI-generated icons.
Naturally, Google presents this characteristic in its ultimate gentle
The second difficulty with AI-generated icons is that they do not lengthen to the cellphone’s app drawer, similar to Themed Icons.
As they don’t seem to be themed, I needed to manually tweak my wallpaper and cellphone theming to discover a tough match. It is a variety of work, and ruined at any time when I open my app drawer.
The third difficulty is the randomness of AI-generated art work. As I discussed earlier, I preferred the Easel impact most.
Nevertheless, whereas some apps (notably Google’s personal) match neatly into this theme, it turned others right into a complicated splodge of colour. Fossify’s Clock app was unrecognizable; I needed to squint to see the obscure define of a clock among the many darkish colours.
When good concepts do not match up with actuality
AI looks like the right method to unify all of your apps, regardless of how area of interest or obscure they’re. Nevertheless, the actuality fails to match expectations as with most AI instruments.
I may redesign my dwelling display screen to make these icons work, however is the lack of productiveness price a number of cookie-shaped icons?
For now, if you would like coherent theming, stick to the Minimal setting. AI-generated icons aren’t there but.