Nano, the smallest AI model in Google’s generative Gemini series, will not be accessible on Pixel 8 smartphones due to “certain hardware limitations.”
Initially revealed in December, Nano is designed to operate on premium Android devices like Google’s latest Pixel 8 Pro and Samsung’s Galaxy S24 lineup. This model offers various advanced AI functionalities on these devices, including transcribing audio recordings into text and Magic Compose, a feature that automates the creation of quick text message responses.
Despite the availability of these features on the Pixel 8 Pro, they will not be extended to the Pixel 8, which was also released in October. During a panel discussion on The Android Show, Terence Zhang, an engineer specializing in generative AI for Google Android, attributed this limitation to hardware constraints. The exact nature of these restrictions remains unclear, especially considering that both the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro are powered by the same Google Tensor G3 processor and CPU/GPU cores. The notable distinction lies in the memory capacity, with the Pixel 8 Pro boasting 12GB of RAM compared to the Pixel 8’s 8GB, suggesting that the lower RAM capacity of the Pixel 8 may hinder the performance of the Nano model, rendering it incompatible with this device.
Google has refrained from providing an official statement on this matter.
Typically, sophisticated large language models demand significant memory and computational resources, posing challenges for implementation on smartphones, even those equipped with 8GB of DRAM.
To address this issue, Google introduced AICore, an Android system service that enables applications to leverage Google Nano for machine learning inference tasks, such as text generation, utilizing available hardware acceleration on the device.
Zhang explained that AICore essentially serves as an API interface for Gemini Nano, with its functionality restricted by the device’s computing capabilities. Devices lacking Nano, such as the Pixel 8, do not have access to AICore.
AICore offers the advantage of enabling apps to leverage Gemini Nano locally on the device without reliance on an external cloud service, ensuring that all text generation processes remain private and enhancing operational speed by reducing latency. Moreover, this service is provided at no cost, as all computations are performed using the device’s hardware, eliminating the expenses associated with cloud-based large language models.
According to Google’s developer documentation, AICore is currently exclusively available on Google Pixel 8 Pro and Samsung S24 Series devices.
Reports suggest that Google intends to introduce additional AI functionalities for its voice-controlled Assistant, powered by the more advanced Gemini Pro and Ultra models, on Pixel devices in the upcoming year.
