Google lets Gemini call businesses for you with new Call for Me trial

Google has opened a limited trial that lets its Gemini model place real phone calls to businesses on a user's behalf. The feature, called Call for Me, is available only to Pixel 11 owners in the United States who subscribe to Gemini and run the beta version of Google's Phone app on Android.

Unlike earlier voice-assistant efforts, the model can now relay pre-approved personal details — name, phone number, preferences — and carry on a full conversation with either a human representative or an IVR system.

This builds on years of phone-automation experiments. At a Google I/O keynote years ago, the company demoed Assistant booking a hair-salon appointment complete with synthetic "umms" and "hmms" to sound natural. Last year brought Ask for Me, which had Gemini check prices and services. Before that came Hold for Me (waits on hold until a rep answers), Talk to a Live Rep (navigates voice menus), and Direct My Call (displays the keypad options for IVR systems). Each solved a slice of the problem; Call for Me tries to stitch them into a single flow.

In practice, the AI can call a store to check stock, book a restaurant table, reschedule an appointment, or ask a shop to hold an item. It identifies itself, navigates menus, waits on hold, and manages the dialogue. The user sees a live transcript and can intervene at any moment. Calls originate from the user's own phone number and are dialed directly from the device — not from a cloud server — which Google says should improve recognition and trust on the business side.

Google is explicit that the rollout starts small because "real-world calls are nuanced," and it needs time to reach acceptable accuracy before expanding. There are no public performance metrics yet — no success rates, average call durations, or error data — so it's hard to gauge how well the system actually replaces human intervention in edge cases: heavy accents, background noise, representatives who simply refuse to talk to a bot.

The move follows Meta, which has already shipped similar capabilities with Muse and Instinct, agents that can also place calls for users. The key differentiator here is the deep OS integration and use of the native phone number, no virtual number or third-party service required. No word yet on when the feature will reach more devices, the stable Phone app, or markets outside the United States. For now, it remains a closed trial for a very narrow audience.