Microsoft confirms Cortana personal assistant is coming to Android this summer

Microsoft today announced that Windows 10 will support Cortana integration not only with their own smartphone, but also for those using Android phones or the iPhone. The functionality will come as part of the OS upgrade happening later this summer.

Microsoft Cortana is a voice assistant service, not all that dissimilar to Siri or Google Search + Google Now. Cortana is actually pretty good at what it does, with some people willing to give it the throne of best voice assistant.

So what’ll it bring? Here’s a quick look at the feature set Microsoft is boasting:

• You can have Cortana remind you to pick up milk the next time you’re at the grocery store, and then your phone will wake up and buzz with the reminder.
• You’ll be able to ask about the weather.
• Or sports scores.
• Or anything else you would head to a search engine for.
• You’ll be able to track a flight using Cortana on both your phone and your PC, and get the updates on the device that you’re on so you don’t miss anything.
• Everything in Cortana’s Notebook will show up across all your devices and any changes you make on one device will be reflected when you use Cortana on any of your other devices.
• The Cortana companion app will help you complete tasks you begin on your PC wherever you are, on your phone.

Unfortunately Android and iOS users won’t be enjoying some of the other things made possible by owning a Windows phone, such as being able to toggle settings. That sort of stuff requires more open access to system settings which Microsoft doesn’t have. Regardless, it’s better than having nothing at all.

Microsoft also detailed some of the other Windows 10 integration being worked on, including syncing your files across devices with OneDrive and being able to play music stored in OneDrive through the Xbox Music app. It all sounds great and we can’t wait for it to arrive.

So when will it happen? Microsoft says a new preview version of Windows 10 is heading out in a few weeks, and the Cortana apps for mobile should be out by the end of June. That’s not a long wait and you can bet we’ll be checking it out to see if it can’t steal us away from Google Now.

[via Microsoft]

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