Your new Pixel 9 has a built-in Satellite SOS feature, much like the one Apple includes in the iPhone. It is also a function that seems to be plenty of of other Android phones, based on the companies involved and the hardware support.
That’s cool and while no one ever wants to need it, it’s good to have. It can mean the difference between something terrible like freezing on top of a mountain or being safe at home. I know which one I would choose.
It uses tech from a company called Skylo and Garmin, but how exactly does it work? This is something you might want to know about before you need it.
How it works
You don’t need anything extra, and the only requirement is to see the sky. All the software you need is built into your Pixel 9.
What you do is call 911 (or the appropriate emergency number in your area) and hope someone answers. If they don’t, because you don’t have cell coverage, you’ll see an option to use Satellite SOS right in the dialer.
Tap it and follow the guide to describe your situation (if you can), then point the phone at the sky as instructed. You should get a message back in a few minutes letting you know someone heard you.
You will be able to demo Satellite SOS in the Security & emergency section of your phone setting.
The cool part is how this all happens. You don’t need to know any of this to use the service, but it’s nice to understand how things really work. I reached out to Skylo and got some answers, and combined with their existing documentation it’s easy to put them together.
Skylo is a tech company that works with satellite companies to send, receive and route messages to and from land-based devices like your phone. It doesn’t launch spacecraft, but it knows how to talk to them.
The emergency message on your phone is sent directly with a high-density, high-energy 3.75 kHz signal to a satellite approximately 23,000 kilometers away. The outgoing messages do not need any kind of base station and that is why the service has such a large footprint.
Once that signal is received by the satellite, it is sent back to a Skylo Earth station. Skylo interprets and routes the information and any additional data such as location to Garmin (the same Garmin that makes things like smartwatches).
Garmin has a 24/7 response team that handles this sort of thing. Garmin is not new to this, and the company offers similar products of its own to help locate and rescue people in need.
Garmin Response then pinpoints where you are based on coordinates sent by the Skylo service, and contacts the correct local response team to ensure you get the help you need.
This is all really cool to me, but the coolest part is that this is just the beginning. Skylo currently supports 10 certified satellite modules and eight certified mobile chipsets from companies such as Qualcomm, Samsung, MediaTek, and Sony. There are already plans to certify even more.
The company’s own technology is present in nine earth-based stations connected to five satellite operators. There are 50 million square kilometers in North America and Europe already covered and the rollout is underway in Asia, Australia and South America.
It won’t be long before you can find the help you need from just about any place on earth, using one of many different phones. Tech like this shouldn’t be locked behind a single product and Skylo is working to make sure it isn’t.
The new AI Pro
The Pixel 9 is Google’s latest and greatest AI phone, powered by the Tensor G4 for all your AI needs. It comes with new capabilities of apps/functions Gemini Live, Pixel Studio, and Call Notes, with processing on the device for many functions that keeps your data away from Google.
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