The Galaxy S8's Dedicated Bixby Button Can Be Remapped Using An App

Samsung has high hopes for Bixby on the Galaxy S8 that it even placed a dedicated button on the device. This might be an annoyance for some users, but luckily someone found a way to remap that button for something else.

YouTube user Dylan Bartwell (Homeguy123 on Reddit) uploaded a video of himself playing around with a demo unit of the Galaxy S8 at a Best Buy. He was able to remap the dedicated Bixby button on the unit without requiring a root access. He was able to reprogram the button to open Google Now instead of Samsung’s Bixby.

Bartwell was able to do this using only a third-party app called “All In One Gestures,” which is actually available for free from the Google Play Store. The app allows users to reprogram all of the physical buttons on the Galaxy S8 or S8+ and not just the Bixby button. This includes the volume buttons as well.

This is a quick and easy solution for a lot of people who aren’t really excited about Bixby. Users should be able to remap the button to open up other apps as well. It could really be useful as a shortcut to opening the camera app, or even Google Assistant. The folks over at the XDA Developers have a complete step-by-step instruction on how to remap the Bixby button using the app.

Speaking of Google Assistant, that is actually also included on the Galaxy S8, which is running Android 7.1.1 Nougat. This is why a lot of people feel like Samsung’s Bixby is unnecessary and or simply redundant.

That said, Bixby has a lot to prove when it’s facing against Google Assistant and Apple’s Siri. So far, we’ve only seen short demonstrations of its capabilities and its performance in real-world situations remains to be seen.