Android 13's first beta has finally arrived, bringing this year's upgrade to anyone brave enough to sign up for Google's beta program. No piece of unreleased software is without its fair share of bugs, and Android 13 is no different. Pixel users likely noticed their search bar reverted to the old-school Google variant, but it might be part of a more significant change in the works since Android 12L.
Left: On-device search on Android 12. Right: Basic Google search on Android 13 Beta 1.
If you install today's beta on a Pixel device, you'll notice the universal search bar that first rolled out with Android 12 has been replaced by the classic Google search bar, incapable of completing on-device requests (via 9to5Google). While apps can still show up in your results, settings and other actions usually found here are nowhere to be seen. It also adopts the old Google search bar look at the top of the app drawer rather than the newer "Search your phone and more" bar seen in Android 12 and later.
At first glance, this seems like a fairly basic bug, an accidental rollback to an older version of the search bar pulled from the days of Android 11. However, an unreleased feature from the Android 12L beta in December might hold the answer to what's going on here. Months ago, Mishaal Rahman from Esper.io tweeted about a new launcher flag meant to transform the launcher search box into the same "AllApps" UI that is accessible from the app drawer on Android 12. With this tweak, the search experience would be the same no matter whether you tapped the home screen box or the one at the top of your app drawer.
This change didn't launch with Android 12L, but considering today's bug in Android 13, it seems like it might finally be in the works. As Rahman notes on Twitter, it's easy to re-enable the newer search bar through ADB commands. This method even includes that combined "one search" experience, providing more evidence that this bug is just early stages of a full transition.
We'll have to wait for future beta releases to see what changes — although it's always possible a server-side brings the newer search box back for everyone. It would represent a massive change in Google's search experience on Android, one we hopefully won't have to wait too long to see come to fruition.