How to remap the Bixby button on your Samsung Galaxy S8, Galaxy S9, Galaxy Note 8 or Galaxy Note 9

On February 20, Samsung launched its latest Galaxy S10 flagship smartphones. The new smartphones by Samsung have a feature using which users can remap the Bixby button. Samsung also rolled out the same feature for its older Galaxy flagships including Galaxy S8, Galaxy S8+, Galaxy S9, Galaxy S9+, Galaxy Note 8 and Galaxy Note 9. So, the update would roll out to all Samsung Galaxy smartphones that have a dedicated Bixby button and have the One UI based on Android Pie running on them.

With the update, you can remap it to launch any other app of your choice including camera, Twitter, Gmail, Google Maps.

However, you will not be able to re-program the Bixby button to launch another digital assistant of your choice. So, if you have a preference for Google Assistant or Cortana, you would still have to rely on apps to use them as they can’t be made to work via the Bixby button.

But even then, this update is a welcome change for most Samsung Galaxy flagship mobile users as Bixby never really became a favourite among masses. Other digital assistants from Google, Amazon and Apple have always garnered more appreciation.

Here’s look at how you can remap the Bixby button on your Samsung Galaxy S8, Galaxy S8+, Galaxy S9, Galaxy S9+, Galaxy Note 9 and Galaxy Note 8:

1. Update your Bixby app to version 2.1.04.18 or higher. You can only remap the button with this version.
2. Launch the Bixby app on your Samsung smartphone and press on the three-dot icon on the right side of the screen.
3. Click on the Settings option.
4. Scroll down and click on the configuration options under Bixby key.
5. Here, you will find the option of launching Bixby on a single press or on a double press. It is worth noticing that Bixby cannot be disabled completely. It will either launch at a single press or a double press. You would also be able to choose from here which app you want to launch instead.

We really hope to see an option of launching Google Assistant or Cortana or Amazon’s Alexa via the Bixby button too. However, for now, this cannot be done as the update does not support it.