The Google I/O keynote could have been all about AI, however there have been a handful of different significant updates that didn’t make it to the principle stage. In addition to updates coming to Google Wallet, the corporate’s developer classes additionally revealed helpful options that may roll out to smartwatches, the Google Play Store, and Google TV.
Here are a number of the updates Google didn’t spotlight in the course of the keynote.
Live Updates are coming to your smartwatch
Google is making ready to convey Live Updates — a characteristic that lets customers observe the standing of sure actions in supply, rideshare, and navigation apps — to your smartwatch. We already knew about Google’s plans to convey it to smartphones with Android 16, however in a developer session noticed by Android Authority, Google’s Aaron Labiaga confirmed that it’ll additionally work on wearables “later in 2026.”
Apple already has the same characteristic, known as Live Activities, that shows at-a-glance standing info on watchOS gadgets.
Google Wallet can take out your boarding cross whenever you get to the airport
Google introduced a bundle of upgrades for Google Wallet, together with a brand new “Nearby Passes notification.” If you allow the characteristic, Google Wallet will immediate you to take out your cross whenever you attain a location the place you may want to make use of it, like a espresso store, airport, or gymnasium. “This notification serves as a direct gateway, permitting customers to seamlessly entry the related cross with a single faucet,” Google says.
Additionally, Google revealed that it’s increasing digital IDs to Arkansas, Montana, Puerto Rico, and West Virginia, and can also be including help for UK passports. It will even permit airways with loyalty playing cards to “mechanically push” boarding passes to customers’ wallets upon check-in.
Google Play will allow you to ask somebody to pay for you
The Google Play Store is including a brand new “Ask another person to pay” button. The characteristic is strictly what it feels like: it’ll let customers “request purchases” from individuals exterior their Google Family by sending them a fee hyperlink. It launched in India first, however now it’s coming to the US, Japan, Indonesia, and Mexico.
Google can also be making an attempt to streamline checkouts by letting customers purchase subscription add-ons with a base subscription with “one value and one transaction.”
Additionally, Google is making an attempt to make it simpler to cease the rollout of buggy apps as properly. The firm says it’ll let builders “halt fully-live releases” to forestall “the distribution of problematic variations to new customers.” The Play Store can also be letting builders improve their listings with a content material carousel and YouTube playlist, together with audio samples for well being and wellness app builders.
There are new subject pages, too, that may let customers flick through “well timed, related, and visually partaking content material” for exhibits, films, and sports activities on the Play Store.
Google and Samsung’s audio codec is coming to Google TV
Android 16 is coming to Google TV, introducing some Material 3 Expressive design modifications, in keeping with 9to5Google. It additionally provides new options like MediaQualityManager, which can let apps mechanically “take management over choosing image profiles.” Google TV will help the Eclipsa Audio codec, the spatial audio format that Google and Samsung are engaged on, as properly.
