Among all the exclusive features that Google Pixel users enjoy, Now Playing is one that doesn’t get much attention. Last month was big for this Pixel-exclusive feature, as Google turned it into a standalone app, with leaks revealing these plans weeks in advance.
Since its release last month, we’ve seen the app’s functionality getting a visual upgrade on the lock screen. There’s now an official update to Now Playing via the Play Store, which appears minor at first glance, but could also restore a recently removed feature.
As 9to5Google reports, the Now Playing app was updated to version 2026.03.24.x late on Friday, replacing version 2026.03.02.x. The new update doesn’t appear to be live on my device yet, and the Play Store listing still shows the latter version as being the latest. This indicates that it isn’t widely available at the moment.
In any case, 9to5 was unable to find any changes to the app following this update, suggesting it may be more about under-the-hood bug fixes than new feature additions. However, according to a Reddit user, the update could bring back the recently removed “Tap to see what’s playing” prompt on the lock screen.
The potential return of ‘Tap to see what’s playing’
When Now Playing was turned into a standalone app, a large portion of the functionality remained unchanged, save for a few. One among these was the ability to tap the Now Playing icon with the “Tap to see what’s playing” option on the lock screen. However, as per the aforementioned Redditor, this particular option has returned.
The user notes they received a notification that Now Playing has a new home, which also marked the return of the lock screen functionality. In its previous form, “Tap to see what’s playing” used to live just below the fingerprint scanner on the Pixel lock screen and was a core part of Now Playing. It’s unclear from the user’s post whether this is related to the v2026.03.24.x update of Now Playing that just rolled out, although the timing does appear to align.
Since becoming an app, Now Playing no longer sends quiet notifications for tracks that were just identified. As 9to5 points out, this functionality has now been replaced with the Quick Settings tile, which can display the song name and artist as long as you’re using the expanded 2×1 tile.
There’s still no dedicated Now Playing widget, as the 1×1 widget that redirects to Now Playing history remains the only option. Let’s hope that changes in the future.
