How to Easily Remap the Bixby 2.0 Button on Samsung Galaxy Note 9
No root required!
The Samsung Galaxy Note 9, which was released earlier this year, features Samsung’s latest Bixby 2.0 which came equipped on last year’s Samsung Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+. Some say that the Bixby 2.0 is more if a downgrade than an update, however, as certain features were stripped out – luckily, there are a few easy ways to remap the Galaxy Note 9’s Bixby 2.0 button and customize it to your liking.
There are a handful of remapping apps for Bixby 2.0, but we’re going to show you the two best, after a lot of testing was done by the development community. Read on to find out how to remap the Bixby button on Samsung Galaxy Note 9, but be warned that these apps will require ADB on your computer – see Appual’s guide “How to Install ADB on Windows”.
App #1: Button Mapper
- Developer: flar2
- Price: Free+
Button Mapper lets you remap any button on your phone, but specifically for our purposes, it lets you remap the Bixby button on the Galaxy Note 9. This app is more reliable than option two, but it does have one downside. You need to run the script every time you reboot your phone. You can follow the tutorial below to set it up.
- Install Button Mapper from the Google Play Store.
- Set up ADB on your computer. You can follow this guide to get it installed.
- Enable ADB by going to Settings > About Phone > Software Information and tap build number 7 times. Once you do this enter your password and go back twice. You can enter the developer options menu now. Just toggle the USB Debugging switch to enable ADB.
- Open the Button Mapper app, at the bottom of the window, there will be a popup asking you to enable accessibility services. You then just enable accessibility services for Button Mapper.
- Select the Bixby Button option at the top of the app. Then click the customize button. Once you do this you will need to run the following commands:
adb shell sh /data/data/flar2.homebutton/keyevent.sh adb shell sh /data/data/flar2.homebutton/keyevent.sh -d
You will need to run this second command every time you reboot your phone. This will also disable Bixby Voice. If you don’t disable Bixby Voice, it will open every time you press the button along with what you have it remapped to. You can re-enable Bixby Voice with the following command:
adb shell sh /data/data/flar2.homebutton/keyevent.sh -e.
You select whatever option you want to use in the single tap and long press menus. You can set it to do things like open Google Assistant or toggle the flashlight.
This app seems to be a bit better in use because it disables Bixby Voice and remaps it. The downside is that you will have to run the ADB command every time you reboot your phone. If you don’t want to have to run the command every time you reboot your phone, option 2 will be for you.
App #2: bxActions
- Developer: Jawomo
- Price: Free+
bxActions is an app that has been doing Bixby remapping since the Samsung Galaxy S8 and Samsung Galaxy S8+ launched last year. This app is pretty reliable for remapping Bixby on the Samsung Galaxy Note 9, but Bixby Voice is still installed so there could be some compatibility issues with that. The developer is actively developing the app so if you do find any bugs, you should expect them to be fixed.
- Join the open beta for bxActions then install the app.
- Install ADB on your computer. You can follow this guide to get it installed.
- Enable ADB by going to Settings > About Phone > Software Information and tap build number 7 times. Once you do this enter your password and go back twice. You can enter the developer options menu now. Just toggle the USB debugging switch to enable ADB.
- Open bxActions and follow the prompts to give it the permissions it needs.
- Select the Bix button options and click the red box that says “please unlock permissions using a PC”
- Run the two commands:
adb shell pm grant com.jamworks.bxactions android.permission.WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS adb shell pm grant com.jamworks.bxactions android.permission.READ_LOGS
Once you do this close and reopen the app.
You can now select the option you want to use to remap the Bixby button on the Samsung Galaxy Note 9. This app has actions like Google Assistant and the flashlight toggle as well.
This app does work well, but it’s not always as reliable as Button Mapper in my experience. It has the great upside of only needing to be enabled once. You don’t even need to run the adb command, but it does make the app faster and more reliable. This app is by no means bad—I would say it’s probably the best for its function. Just sometimes, I have found it to be unreliable on my Galaxy Note 9.
What can you remap the Bixby 2.0 button to do?
Button Mapper lets you remap the Bixby button on the Samsung Galaxy Note 9 to either a long press or a single press. Once you do this you can remap it to one of the actions in the list below. There are also options for Zello, which is a walkie-talkie app. There are Pro options for disabling Bixby when locked and vibration on button press.
- Default
- Home
- Back
- Recent apps
- Show menu
- Last app
- Turn the screen off
- Toggle flashlight
- Power dialog
- Screenshot
- Split screen
- Tasker intent
- Do not disturb
- Toggle silent/vibration
- Mute volume
- Mute microphone
- Volume +
- Volume –
- Previous track
- Next track
- Play/Pause
- Scroll up
- Scroll down
- Copy
- Paste
- Kill foreground app
- Quick settings
- Notifications
- Clear notifications
- Brightness +
- Brightness –
- Toggle auto brightness
- Toggle BlueTooth
- Toggle WiFi
- Toggle portrait
- Change keyboard
- Open URL
- Zello PTT (Pro only)
- Search
- Assistant
- Open any application
bxActions has options for both a single press and long press, along with a long press on the lock screen. The long press and long press on lock screen both require the pro mode to be unlocked for $3. You can remap the Bixby button on the Samsung Galaxy Note 9 to the actions below.
- Disable Bixby
- Enable Bixby
- Home
- Back
- Phone (dialer)
- Camera
- Launch application
- Launch shortcut action
- Launch Tasker task (Pro)
- Google Now
- Google assistant
- Google assistant extra (supports direct speech input and “whats on my screen” action
- Media play/pause
- Media next
- Volume up
- Volume down
- Do not disturb (silent)
- Sound mode (Sound, vibrate, silent)
- Sound mode iOS (Sound, vibrate) (Pro)
- Task manager
- Power menu
- Notification center
- Settings tray
- Toggle auto rotation
- Toggle split screen (Pro)
- Flashlight (system)
- Flashlight (extra power)
- Take screenshot
- Fullscreen on/off
- Fullscreen for the current app
- Cancel all and mark all notifications as read (Pro)
- Mark as read (Pro)
- Heads-up notifications on/off (Pro)
- Take a screenshot with Samsung Capture (Pro and root)
So there you have it – if you experience any problems in getting either of these apps to work on your Samsung Galaxy Note 9, please let us know in the comments!
