Honor's latest smartphones are getting this cool Google AI feature before Pixel devices

Honor’s newest phones are getting a neat AI trick that even Google’s own Pixels can’t run yet. According to a report by The Verge, the Honor 400 and 400 Pro will be the first handsets to let you turn any still photo into a short video, thanks to Google’s Veo 2 model.

The tool lives right in the Gallery app. You pick a picture, tap the video button, and in a minute or two you have a five-second clip in portrait or landscape. There is no text prompt to guide the AI. You simply hope it makes your subject move in a believable way.

In tests, it works well on simple scenes. A clear photo of a pet or a person often comes alive with realistic motion. But more complex images can produce odd results, as noted by the publication. Here are some GIFs the publication shared:

Honor will let 400 series buyers enjoy ten free video generations a day for the first two months. After that, Google plans to fold it into a paid model, though pricing details are still up in the air. Honor’s UK marketing director, Chris Langley, told The Verge that a subscription will eventually be required.

Right now Google’s own Gemini Advanced service can generate video from text, but it does not yet offer image-to-video on Pixel phones. On Google Cloud, Veo 2’s video feature is available only to approved partners and costs fifty cents per second of output. Honor’s move puts a cutting-edge AI tool in the hands of everyday buyers weeks before Pixel users get a chance to try it.

This feature is the latest fruit of the deeper collaboration that Honor and Google announced in mid-April. It shows that Honor is ready to lean on Google’s AI research to stand out in a crowded market. Pixel fans may have to wait for the next software update to bag the feature.

As usual, we’ll let you know when it goes live for Pixel devices, hopefully soon. I can’t wait to test it!