Google Lens can now identify the breed of that cute dog you just saw

Google celebrated National Pet Day this week by adding a couple of new animal-focused features to its Photos app.

In a blog post peppered with some undeniably cringeworthy wordplay, Google Photos product manager Kristi Bohl highlights “a few pet-tential ways” to mark the day.

Under the title “puparazzi alert,” Bohl explains that if you happen to take a lot of photos of your beloved pet — and who out there doesn’t take a lot of photos of their beloved pet? — then its Photos app may now take it upon itself to show you how the best of those images would look in a lovely photo book.

“We use machine learning to save you time by selecting the best photos of your four-legged friend and laying them out in a photo book,” Google’s product manager writes. “For those of you in the U.S. or Canada, all you have to do is decide if you want a hardcover or softcover book, and then order.”

Next up is a new feature for Google Lens, the company’s A.I.-powered photo-analyzing tool that works inside Photos and recently became available for most Android devices as well as the iPhone. This means that if you’re a fan of taking pictures of cute dogs and cats that you stroll by on a day out, Lens will use its smarts to quickly tell you the breed of the animal and also offer up some information about it.

Simply open Google Photos, select the image and then tap on the Lens icon at the bottom of the display to pull up the data.

Another suggestion from Bohl is to transform your dog or cat into a Hollywood movie star, or something similar. “If your pet is ready for a big screen debut, open your Google Photos app, go to the Assistant tab, and click on the movie button,” Bohl says. “Then, if available, choose the Meow Movie or Doggie Movie option, select your pet, and we’ll compile the best photos of your four-legged pal into a movie, set to pet-themed music.”

The product manager reminds us that Photos also lets you search your personal image library by breed, species, and even emoji.

With all of Photos’ animal-related features well and truly communicated, Bohl ends her post like this (brace yourself): “Howevfur you pampurr your pets, we hope you can try out a few of the features that Google Photos has to off-fur.” Ouch!