Summary
- CES 2024: Google reveals the official name for Android’s 3D mascot — it’s called The Bot. While not quite quirky, it’s still a simple and memorable name.
- The Bot made an appearance in Las Vegas during the ongoing CES event on the grand Sphere and was featured in various avatars on that giant screen.
- Google also renamed Nearby Share to Quick Share, merging it with Samsung’s feature to expand compatibility, and introduced Google Cast support on LG TVs, among other things.
CES 2024 is in full swing right now, and Google has made a ton of new announcements, ranging from Google Cast support for LG TVs to a new intuitive way of sending media from your Pixel phone to the Pixel Tablet. But among those big announcements, one little detail went under the radar. The new 3D mascot for Android actually has an official name, and it isn’t something we’ve been calling it all along.
The green bugdroid has been Android’s identity for well over a decade and has become synonymous with Google’s smartphone operating system. It has gone through a series of changes all these years, and Google has used it quite playfully to project Android’s fun image. A few months ago, the mascot got a big visual upgrade, giving it a 3D persona so that it can be represented equally well digitally as well as in real life with those striking sculptures at Google headquarters. But even then, the company didn’t reveal (or even hint at) what the mascot is called and kept referring to it with a generic robot moniker.
But during the ongoing CES, Google finally revealed what it’s called. The official announcement blog post from the company refers to it as The Bot (via 9to5Google). While not quite a funky, anthropomorphized name we expected considering the whole new personality it gained with the last redesign, The Bot is still quite an uncomplicated name that should be easy to remember.
Like every year, this year’s CES is happening in Las Vegas as well, where The Bot also made an appearance on the grand Sphere. You could see it in many avatars on that giant igloo-shaped screen. Besides that, Google also created an AR-based guided tour of its CES booth, which is perhaps the biggest one so far at any CES, considering Google has expanded its product and service portfolio so much in the last few years. We have put together a list of everything Google has announced at the CES 2024, courtesy of our own Will Sattelberg, who is on the ground at the CES, along with AP’s Gadgets Editor Taylor Kerns, to bring you everything fun and quirky from this year’s first tech extravaganza.
Among other announcements from Google, the most notable one is the renaming of Nearby Share to Quick Share — the latter has been a Samsung feature, but the two services are now coming together. With this merger, Google intends to expand Quick Share’s compatibility across brands and devices, and you should start seeing the change sooner rather than later. Besides that, LG TVs released 2024 onwards will ship with Chromecast built-in for casting your media from your phone to the TV.
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