Google has finally added Google Messages support for the HiLight LED, breathing a little more life into the rather limited Pixel 11 feature. The LED will now light up upon receiving messages, making it slightly more useful.
Arriving as part of the November Pixel Drop, the Pixel 11's HiLight feature has gained Google Messages support. The HiLight LED at the back will now light up when users receive messages from their favourite contacts.
And as with calls, users can assign custom colours to their favourite contacts, so they can tell at a glance who has messaged them on their Google Pixel smartphone.
While the update is certainly a step in the right direction, the HiLight feature is still very limited. Two months after its release, it's still locked to Google Phone, Messages, and Gemini. Plus, the only third-party app HiLight supports is WhatsApp. Anything more, and users will need to rely on third-party workarounds like the HiLight Studio app.
However, Google appears to be working on a more flexible integration, as a new "Notification Rules" feature has been spotted in Android 17 QPR3 Beta builds. This could finally unlock the HiLight LED to broadcast a wide variety of high-priority alerts across the OS.
That said, while Google continues to broaden HiLight support, its inability to alert users about other apps and to customise deeply remains a hindrance. We believe it's still a half-baked implementation and nowhere close to reaching even a quarter of its potential.
Industry contenders like Nothing did a far better job with LED-based notification alerts at launch, and Google clearly needs to learn a thing or two from them. We seriously hope Google levels up its game, or at the very least, opens the HiLight SDK to developers for faster development.
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