Google Contacts widget rolls out messages and call notifications

In addition to A/B testing a change to how you add a new contact, Google Contacts is rolling out the ability to display notifications on widgets.

We first saw signs of this capability in late February. Once available, the Individual Contact widget will display a notification bell icon with a badge in the upper right corner. It joins the background image and shortcuts for calling and sending messages.

The widget must be set to a rectangle portrait configuration, the circular or pill variant is not compatible.

A prompt explains how you can “see and respond to the latest messages from your contacts.” The setup process involves granting “Allow access to notifications,” specifically the “Conversations” and “Notifications” permissions.

It can be used to view missed calls, messages and “important dates and more”. The latter probably means birthdays and any other dates you added manually.

This feature essentially replicates Android’s system-level Conversations widget, which was introduced with Android 12 but hasn’t seen any updates since then.

Widget notifications are rolling out with version 4.31 of Google Contacts, but are not yet widely deployed today.