July’s Play system update has some Google Wallet preparations in tow
Google announced that it wouldrebrand parts of Google Pay to Google Walletback in May during its annual developer conference. Some time has passed since then, and we haven’t heard much about the company’s aspirations. This is now bound to change, as Google has just released the changelog for its latest Google Play system update, rolling out to all Android phones in the background via the Play Store.
Theupdate notesreveal that Google is planning to update the Google Pay app, bringing the experience to the latest Google Material design revision along with rebranding it as Google Wallet. This change will in all likelihood not affect the new GPay app with its peer-to-peer payment options that Google updated a while back. Instead, this will affect the old Google Pay app that is part of the Play Services. It is the one that you use to pay contactless in stores, and it’s tightly integrated with the lock screen on the Pixel 6 and 6 Pro.
While we haven’t seen the new design in the wild just yet, Google shared images of what we can expect during Google I/O in May. The new look does indeed feature more Material You components, with colors extracted from loyalty card logos and passes and more rounded corners everywhere, including a new “Add to wallet” floating button right in line with the Material Design 3 specifications.
Further updates coming as part of the July release are listed in the changelog below.
Account Management
Device Connectivity
Google Play Store
Developer Services
Google has been updating certain components of Android via the Play Services for a long time now. Some parts of the operating system can be updated independently of a full OS upgrade, and Google takes advantage of this to bring new features to all Android devices, regardless of when they are due for a system update. The company started detailing what’s new with each of these updates at the beginning of this year.
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