Google Messages will soon ‘nudge’ you to reply to conversations you forgot to follow up on

XDA Developers has uncovered a ‘Nudge’ feature in their latest teardown of the Google Messages for Android app (version 9.5). Several code strings show that Google will ping users and remind them to reply to conversations they may have forgotten about days prior.

Not only that, but any messages that may need attention via a follow-up will appear at the top of your inbox so long as you have ‘Nudges’ toggled on in the app’s settings. When it rolls out, this setting will be called ‘Suggest messages to reply to’. Similarly, a second setting called ‘Suggest messages to follow up on’ can also be turned on.

In these early stages, it’s unclear how Google will determine whether or not you need to ‘follow up’ on a message, but since it’s being distinguished here from the messages you still haven’t replied to, it could be that it will use some form of AI or machine learning to intelligently identify times, dates, locations, and more in the same way that Assistant’s ‘What’s on my screen’ has done in the past when injected into conversations.

It’s worth noting that you can already set manual reminders for any message you don’t have time to follow up on in the moment by pressing, holding, and choosing a time to snooze it until, but since I’ve completely forgotten to take advantage of this feature (and you probably have as well), Google looks to be attempting some automation to make Messages do the work for you.

With Message categories and starred messages still not rolled out to the masses, as well as the app automatically deleting one-time password texts, Google’s SMS and RCS application is getting pretty useful. Let me know if you’re utilizing any of these early features yet, or if you’re still hanging in the balance awaiting their arrival like the rest of us.