Interview with Google's Android leader Sameer Samat

Summary

My conversation with Sameer Samat, Android’s daddy…er…the President of Android Ecosystem at Google, started with him quizzing me.Perhaps he noticed my MacBook Pro or the Apple Watch on my wrist. I did make sure to at least record the interview with the lovely new Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7 I’m testing, but Samat wanted to understand how and, maybe why, I’m using a Mac.I stammered, unprepared for the interrogation, but Samat wasn’t asking me why I don’t use Android. Instead, he’s curious about the apps I use on my laptop and how I manage the world of my iPhone, MacBook, and Apple Watch.“I asked because we’re going to be combining ChromeOS and Android into a single platform, and I am very interested in how people are using their laptops these days and what they’re getting done,” Samat explained.I was relieved as we shifted to talking about Chrome, Chrome OS, Mobile CPUs in laptops, and how we both used to upgrade our own system RAM before finally getting to the topics I’m most interested in: Android, Gemini, Samsung, Galaxy AI, and Android XR.It’s already been a big year for Google and Android, which Samat, a 16-year Google veteran, runs. Android 16 (code-name Baclava) was officially unveiled at Google I/O 2025 in May, bringing with it Material 3 Expressive, which Samat termed the platform’s “biggest design change in Android in three or four years.”Android 16 arrives with more support for tablet-sized canvases, smoother animations, and far more customization, including the ability to take a photo, set it as your wallpaper, and then bleed the image’s color palette throughout the system into places like Gmail and even third-party apps.Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more.Samat told me the goal was to make something “modern and delightful” but also “approachable and familiar,” avoiding a “who moved my cheese” scenario.Making it yoursPerhaps that’s why, to me at least, Android 16 feels incremental, but in a good way. I recognize everything, b...