Most of us travel to and from our place of work. While some may use their own vehicles, others rely on public transport for commuting. Your Google Pixel phone comes with a bunch of prebuilt and customizable profiles called Modes that offer extensive control over device actions, notifications, and more.
While there are modes for Driving, Bedtime, Do not Disturb, etc., as well as the ability to create your own, there isn’t one for commuting. Evidence from a Chrome Canary release some months ago revealed a new mode called Transit mode, specifically for this purpose. We’re now getting a decent first look at this upcoming addition, courtesy of 9to5Google.
A support page for Transit mode and the corresponding At a Glance commute alerts details how they work. Although these features aren’t widely rolled out yet, 9to5 is offering a decent early glimpse of Transit mode.
When available, just head over to Settings > Modes > Transit to enable or customize it. From here, you can dive into App Settings and find Set up commute notifications to have the necessary commute-related information relayed to you via At a Glance.
This process isn’t as simple, though. Enabling commute notifications requires users to follow on-screen instructions to set their home and work locations and grant the necessary permissions. However, At a Glance commute notifications won’t appear immediately. Google says Maps will learn your commuting patterns over time, with the process expected to take 2–3 weeks.
Not too different from other Modes on your Pixel
Naturally, Transit Mode is heavily customizable. Users will have extensive control over the notifications they receive from specific apps and people. So it’s not too different than any other mode available on your Pixel phone in that regard. There’s also a toggle to “Use Bluetooth while commuting,” which should be helpful if your commute includes Bluetooth headphones or earbuds.
As Android Authority points out, some questions remain unanswered about Transit mode. Their initial reporting on this feature suggested that this profile could also be enabled via the dedicated Quick Settings tile for Modes. However, it’s unclear whether this will be the case when Transit mode rolls out widely to all users.
This one change stopped Pixel’s At a Glance widget from fighting my wallpaper
Enable ‘High contrast mode’
It’s hard to say exactly when these commute-related features will be available to Pixel users. But given that the support page is already up, we don’t think it will be too long before they land.
Google noted in its March Feature Drop announcement that real-time transit info via At a Glance will only be available on the Pixel 7 and newer devices. However, the support page doesn’t mention these restrictions, nor does it specify if Transit mode also has a similar device requirement.
