Gemini doesn’t play nice with the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6

Samsung officially announced the Galaxy Z Flip 6 at its Paris Unpacked event last week. I’ve been using the phone for a few days now, and I’m having a good time with it — much better than my last Z Flip experience.

The Flip 6 is a moderate improvement from last year’s Flip 5, but compared to the two-year-old Z Flip 4 I’m coming from, changes like a more thoughtful build, better cameras, and a larger cover display are really making a difference for me. But as handy as that bigger outside screen has been for walking directions and quick text replies, it’s oddly frustrating to use with my assistant app of choice.

By default, the only digital assistant you can talk to on the Z Flip 6 when it’s folded shut is Bixby. Both Google Assistant and Gemini can listen for “hey Google” while the phone is closed, but they can’t actually do anything — either app will prompt you to open the phone to continue.

Just like the Flip 5, the Flip 6 puts seemingly arbitrary restrictions on which apps work on its cover display out of the box, and neither Assistant nor Gemini is on the list of approved apps. There’s a convoluted way around those restrictions, but even after taking the necessary steps to enable Gemini, things are still weird.

With Gemini manually enabled on the Z Flip 6’s cover display, you can open the app from an app drawer and interact with it normally — you can even talk to it by tapping the on-screen microphone icon. But you still can’t call it up by saying “hey Google” when the phone is closed; that just prompts the same “flip open for more” message as always.

Taking the same steps to enable Google Assistant, meanwhile, gets you the full experience. Assistant responds to “hey Google” commands on the Flip 6 the same way it does on any other phone, whether it’s open or closed. But if you install Gemini, you have no choice but to disable Google Assistant; it’s a requirement for using the app at all. If you want to install Gemini on your Galaxy Z Flip 6, you’ll either have to give up hands-free voice interaction or get to know Bixby.

Motorola’s Razr phones don’t have this problem

But there’s always the Gemini web app

This is all frustrating, especially given Samsung’s main rival in the flip phone space, Motorola, allows full Gemini functionality on the cover screens for its latest Razr phones. But the Flip 6 just launched, and it’s entirely possible this quirk will be ironed out in software updates eventually. In the meantime, if you want access to Gemini on your Flip without giving up Google Assistant, you can always use the web interface at gemini.google.com. It’s not quite as seamless as the app, but it’s something.