Samsung's Bixby 3.0 update gets smarter with support for Indian English

Bixby's latest 3.0 update allows the company's smart assistant to understand Indian names and relationships, like Maa or Bhaiya, local places, recipes and other content.

Samsung's Bixby assistant now understand terms said in Indian English. (Samsung )

Bixby isn't the first name that springs to mind every time virtual smart assistants are mentioned, but Samsung hasn't abandoned its voice-based assistant yet. With regular feature updates and improvements to the interface, Bixby has kept up with the company's design improvements to its One UI skin, and the latest version 3.0 update brings Indian English support along with features designed for users across the country.

The South Korean company announced online that Bixby will now be able to understand Indian names and relationships (like Maa or Bhaiya), local places, recipes and other content. It will also be able to quickly get started with daily routines with voice commands, such as “Start Yoga timer” or “recipe for Aloo Paratha” which Bixby will be able to understand.

For example, if you want to tell Bixby that you are related to three contacts, you can head over to the Contacts section and click on the profile image to set relationships such as your mother or brother. While the contacts will still show in English, Bixby will immediately understand what you mean when you speak with Hindi-specific terms. This can also be set from inside Bixby itself by saying “Call papa” which will then prompt you to set a contact as your father.

However, in order to enable the India specific features, users will have to set the assistant's language to English (India) by heading into the app's language settings. The feature itself is limited to the company's latest higher-end offerings, like the Galaxy S21, the Galaxy A72 and the Galaxy A52, but could roll out to other devices soon, according to SamMobile.