TECH

Glance introduces customized lock screen content to US phones through Motorola and Verizon

Google-backed India-based company Glance's lock screen platform has been finding success in its home country as well as Japan and Southeast Asia for a while now, writes TechCrunch. It reaches more than 450 million smartphones and is active on about 300 million of them, offering users a customized feed that includes personalized recommendations for news, sports, games, events, and more. It also shows ads, of course.

There were reports a couple of years ago claiming Glance wanted to partner with US carriers, thereby bringing lock screen content to the United States. Nothing came of that, but it seems the time is now right for the company to break into the American market.

Glance has reportedly started a pilot program in the US thanks to a partnership with Motorola and Verizon ahead of a full launch later this year. Its app already comes pre-installed on the 2024 Moto G Power, and is expected to expand to more Motorola and Verizon devices if the pilot proves successful.

9To5Google tested the Glance platform and reports that it isn't overly invasive. Users are asked to enable Glance on the lock screen during the setup process, so you can just keep the feature turned off at this early point.

Those who do enable Glance, be it by choice or by accident, will see content in widgets when they light up their lock screens. It's mostly news items, which users can tailor to show specific categories, such as politics, tech, entertainment, etc. If you do want to turn it off, this can be easily done in the lock screen settings, though you'll reportedly see occasional prompts to turn it back on, which sounds annoying.

Glance doesn't collect user data; it uses usage patterns for its personal recommendations. The company is said to be working with Qualcomm to build an AI-powered lock screen experience that will allow much of the processing to be done on-device rather than through cloud services.

Unlike in other locations, Glance doesn't plan to show ads on lock screens in the US, according to a source. That could always change, of course.

Ads on phone lock screens have been causing controversy for years. Amazon offered discounts on Android phones, including the Moto G, in 2016 if users opted for the devices to ship with personalized ads on the lock screen and notifications tray. A few years later, there were reports of ads appearing on Huawei phone lock screens, though this was unintentional and the ads were quickly removed.

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