Google details MCP-like ‘AppFunctions’ that let Gemini use Android apps – 9to5Google

Following the Gemini automation announcement today, Google is detailing how all this works under the hood on Android.

Google is “introducing early stage developer capabilities that bridge the gap between your apps and agentic apps and personalized assistants, such as Google Gemini.”

While we are in the early, beta stages of this journey, we’re designing these features with privacy and security at their core as our first step in exploring this paradigm shift as an app ecosystem.

AppFunctions

Android has two approaches, starting with AppFunctions. This was quietly announced last year and is only now being fully detailed. 

AppFunctions is an Android 16 platform feature and an accompanying Jetpack library that allows apps to expose specific functions for callers, such as agent apps, to access and execute on device.

Developers detail their app’s capabilities as tools that agents and AI assistants (like Gemini) can use. Google equates AppFunctions to the Model Context Protocol (MCP) that’s popular for agents and server-side tools. However, these functions happen locally on the Android device. Example use cases are:

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• Task management and productivity
  • User request: “Remind me to pick up my package at work today at 5 PM“.
  • AppFunction action: The caller identifies the relevant task management app and invokes a function to create a task, automatically populating the title, time, and location fields based on the user’s prompt.
• Media and entertainment
  • User request: “Create a new playlist with the top jazz albums from this year“.
  • AppFunction action: The caller executes a playlist creation function within a music app, passing context like “top jazz albums for 2026” as the query to generate and launch the content immediately.
• Cross-app workflows
  • User request: “Find the noodle recipe from Lisa’s email and add the ingredients to my shopping list“.
  • AppFunction action: This request uses functions from multiple apps. First, the caller uses an email app’s search function to retrieve the content. Then, it extracts the relevant ingredients and invokes a shopping list app’s function to populate the user’s list.
• Calendar and scheduling
  • User request: “Add Mom’s birthday party to my calendar for next Monday at 6 PM“.
  • AppFunction action: The approved agentic app invokes the calendar app’s “create event” function, parsing the relevant context like “next Monday” and “6 PM” to create the entry without the user needing to manually open the calendar.

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Below is an example of AppFunctions utilizing the Samsung Gallery app on the Galaxy S26. It’s also coming to Samsung devices running OneUI 8.5 and higher.

Instead of manually scrolling through photo albums, you can now simply ask Gemini to “Show me pictures of my cat from Samsung Gallery.” Gemini takes the user query, intelligently identifies and triggers the right function, and presents the returned photos from Samsung Gallery directly in the Gemini app, so users never need to leave. This experience is multimodal and can be done via voice or text. Users can even use the returned photos in follow-up conversations, like sending them to friends in a text message.

Meanwhile, Google says the Gemini app is already using AppFunctions to power its Calendar, Notes, and Tasks integrations in Google apps and OEM defaults. 

UI automation

Android is also working on a second approach as seen with the Gemini automation announced for the Galaxy S26 and Pixel 10 series this morning. 

While AppFunctions provides a structured framework and more control for apps to communicate with AI agents and assistants, we know that not every interaction has a dedicated integration yet.

Google is “developing a UI automation framework for AI agents and assistants to intelligently execute generic tasks on users’ installed apps.”

This is the platform doing the heavy lifting, so developers can get agentic reach with zero code. It’s a low-effort way to extend their reach without a major engineering lift right now. 

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Google says Android 17 will “broaden these capabilities to reach even more users, developers, and device manufacturers.”

We are currently building experiences with a small set of app developers, focusing on high-quality user experiences as the ecosystem evolves. We plan to share more details later this year on how you can use AppFunctions and UI automation to enable agentic integrations for your app. Stay tuned for updates.