By Abner Li
Publication Date: 2026-01-19 17:41:00
Phone by Google is now fully compliant with Material 3 Expressive after shrinking its bottom bar.
While the app was updated with M3 Expressive last year, it retained a tall bottom bar for Home, Keypad, and Voicemail.
With stable version 204 (which rolled out last week), Google Phone now has the short navigation component. You’ll definitely notice the reduced padding above the pill-shaped tab indicator. Google has also made tweaks to the text label underneath. This is a server-side update, so be sure to Force stop from App info.
This change is more apparent with the dark theme, while the actual space savings are quite minimal. It’s more of a consistency change, with Google Home seeing a similar update last month. The main exception today is Google Photos, as well as stragglers like Google Fi and Voice.
Old vs. new
Meanwhile, Google Phone has yet to bring back the…
