Android P gets Dashboard that gives users insight into smartphone use

Google will provide Android P with Dashboard. That’s a feature that tracks how much time users spend in certain apps, how often they get notifications, and how many times a day they unlock their phone.

Google says it wants to help users with the Dashboard to find a balance when using their phone. According to Google, apps can also contribute to this. For example, from this week YouTube will have a function to group all notifications in a daily digest, so that users receive one notification in a day instead of several separate notifications. The Dashboard will be introduced in Android P. It is not yet clear whether the functionality will also come to older Android versions.

In his keynote address at the I/O developer conference, Google CEO Sundar Pichai says his company will pay more attention to the “digital wellbeing” of people. Later today, a so-called Digital Wellbeing website will be online, which should provide more information about this.

Pichai also mentioned Family Link, an app that Google previously released in the US. At the presentation, the CEO showed how parents can use this to set a maximum screen time on children’s devices. Family Link is likely to become more widely available, but when is unknown.