Samsung phone's voice assistant now speaks English

Samsung's Galaxy Note 7 is demonstrated in New York, on July 28, 2016. (AP / Richard Drew)

SEOUL, Korea, Republic Of - Samsung Electronics says its Bixby voice assistant for smartphones will start speaking English but only in two countries: South Korea and the U.S.

The South Korean tech giant says starting Wednesday, users of the Galaxy S8 smartphones can speak in American English to their phones to turn on the flashlight, to take a selfie or to make the phone search the pictures from a summer vacation and create an album.

The service, comparable to Apple's Siri or Google Assistant, was previously available only in Korean.

Samsung says its virtual assistant can be activated by saying "Hi Bixby" to the phone or by clicking the button on the side of the S8 phones.

The rollout of the Bixby English version was delayed by a couple of months.