BIXBY AT YOUR SERVICE!

Samsung’s new virtual assistant has finally found its voice

‘BIXBY, when I’m near the mall remind me, ‘No more shoes!’ ” “Got it, I’ll remind you.” In response to Apple’s Siri, Amazon’s Alexa and Google Now, Samsung has launched an artificial intelligence-equipped digital assistant of its own – Bixby. It’s still available only on Samsung’s latest smartphone release, the Galaxy S8 and the S8+. These came preloaded with basic Bixby functions (such as the pretty limited Bixby Home – essentially a quick view of your day at a glance), accessible with a dedicated button on the left side of the phone.

But now the company has made several much-needed updates to the function, giving Bixby a few pretty sleek voice capabilities.

The tech giant sees the voice-powered assistant being used in its entire range of products – so you might soon be able to give voice commands to your washing machine or television.

But for now Samsung’s primary goal with Bixby is “to make the interface of the phone simpler and more natural to use”, according to Injong Rhee, Samsung’s head of research and development for software and services.

Bixby – triggered by simply saying, “Hey, Bixby” – is great for simple tasks. You can tell it to “Call Mom”, “Lock the screen” or “Show me the Quick Panel” but it can also handle chain commands such as “Open the Gallery app, open the first photo and open ‘edit’ ” with relative ease.

Bixby is streets ahead of Siri but its robotic voice still doesn’t quite match the smoothness of Alexa’s.

Bixby Voice is currently available on US devices, with Samsung expected to roll out the functionality to the S8s in other parts of the world in the coming months.