Apple’s iOS 27 expands Visual Intelligence to let users search items already displayed on an iPhone screen — for example pausing a video, taking a screenshot and searching for a lamp or turning event text into a calendar entry — but Apple Intelligence on iOS 27 requires an iPhone 15 Pro, iPhone 15 Pro Max or an iPhone 16 model or later and availability can vary by language and region.
Fox News reported Oct. 6, 2026, that the article’s guide explains how Visual Intelligence can offer visual search, questions about screen content, text summaries, Read Aloud and actions such as adding an event to Calendar; it also describes Camera Control and a Siri AI camera mode in iOS 27 for supported devices. Apple places Visual Intelligence controls under Settings > Siri, the report says.
Samsung and Google provide a similar feature called Circle to Search. According to the Fox News guide, Circle to Search works on select Galaxy devices running Android 14 with One UI 6.1 or later (One UI 9 began rolling out in September 2026 but is not required). To enable Circle to Search on Galaxy, go to Settings > Display > Navigation bar and turn on Circle to Search; the feature can be opened from the Home button or navigation handle and also works while the Camera app is open on supported Galaxy devices.
Fox News says Circle to Search is available on Google Pixel phones (Pixel 6 and later) and uses the same underlying capability as on Galaxy devices. To enable it on Pixel, the guide recommends searching for “Circle to Search” in Settings, tapping the result and enabling the feature. If it does not work, Fox News advises checking Settings > Apps > Default apps > Digital assistant app and ensuring Google is selected and “Use screen and app data” (or Analyze on-screen images) is enabled, and keeping the Google app up to date.
The Fox News guide notes some apps can block screen capture or analysis (for security or copyright reasons), which will prevent these tools from working inside those apps, and that selection borders can be adjusted when choosing what to search. It also reports Google can save Circle to Search activity with other Google Search activity and that Apple says many Apple Intelligence requests run on device while more complex requests may use Private Cloud Compute; Apple says data sent to Private Cloud Compute is used to fulfill the request and is not retained by that system afterward.
Fox News’s guide cautions users to be selective about using visual search on highly sensitive screens such as banking, medical or password pages and to double-check important results, because visual search can misidentify objects or return similar-looking matches rather than exact answers.
Jon Ross Myers is the executive editor and publisher of the Mississippi News Network, Mississippi's largest digital only media company. He can be reached at editor@tippahnews.com
