Google’s “Nearby Share” Is Now Rolling out in Play Services Beta

Jul. 1, 2020

Google has reportedly started rolling out its long-awaited much-neededNearby Sharingfeature through thelatest beta version of Google Play Services. The featurewill be available on devices running Android 6 (Marshmallow) and later.

“We’re currently conducting a beta test of a new Nearby Share feature that we plan to share more information on in the future. Our goal is to launch the feature with support for Android 6+ devices as well as other platforms,”a Google representative told Android Police.

For the uninitiated, Nearby Sharr lets users share files with devices in the supported proximity without much hassle. In the future, Nearby Sharing is expected to offersupport for  Windows, Mac, Linux, andChrome OS.

When enabled, a “Nearby Share” icon will appear in the share sheet. In addition, you may also see a neat “Nearby” button in the share sheet, as spotted earlier this month in aYouTube videopart of Google’s “11 Weeks of Android”.Image: Android Police

Interestingly, Google’s Nearby Share offers three visibility settings – All Contacts, Some Contacts, and Hidden. You get to choose the visibility setting you prefer. Below is how the sharing process would look like, courtesy ofAndroid Police.Image: Android Police

Android Policenotes that Nearby Sharingrequires a server-side componentto work. Hence, you may not necessarily see Nearby Sharing on your compatible Android phone running on thelatest Google Play Services beta. When I tried, the feature didn’t show up on my OnePlus 7T.

Now that the feature is ready for public beta testing, we could expect the company to announce it with thePixel 4aor hopefully later this year alongside thePixel 5.

Subin writes about consumer tech, software, and security. He secretly misses the headphone jack while pretending he’s better off with the wireless freedom.