Most accessibility features hide in a settings menu you'll never open. This one is different: Google's new Sign-to-Text on the Pixel 11 runs through Gboard, Google's keyboard, so it works anywhere Gboard can type — messages, notes, email, chat. No separate app to open, no copying and pasting between screens. Point the camera at the signing, and the words appear as text as they're signed.
A conversation shouldn't stop just because one person signs and the other doesn't.
Set it up in four steps
- Update Gboard to the latest version. Sign-to-Text rides on Google's keyboard, so start by making sure Gboard itself is current.
- Set your keyboard language to English (US) or English (Canada). Those are the language options Sign-to-Text works with.
- Grant Gboard camera permission when it asks. The camera is how it watches the signing — it will prompt you the first time.
- Open any app that accepts Gboard input and start signing. That's the whole trick — if the keyboard can appear there, Sign-to-Text can work there.
The privacy detail worth knowing
A camera pointed at a conversation deserves one clear answer, and Google gives one: only 2D movement keypoints — not your actual video — are sent to its servers, and your input isn't saved or used to train models. The signing is read as movement, not kept as footage.
Who this helps
- Friends and family across a signing gap — one person signs, the other reads, in the same chat thread you were already using.
- Work and school threads — group chats and shared docs where typed English is the common language.
- Anyone learning ASL — a patient, instant way to see your signing come back as text.
Small setting, big idea. The best accessibility features don't ask anyone to switch apps or switch rooms — they just remove the pause between two people who want to talk.
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