How Google could turn Android into just another subscription

Credit: Jenu Prasad / Google

At a time when version updates are becoming less of an issue and major phone makers are finally starting to promise years of updates, Google may have found a way to eliminate the Android cookie time and time again: by turning it into service.

The signs are there. On February 11, Google announced that several “Pixel-first” features in Google Photos – Portrait Blur, Portrait Light, and Color Pop – will certainly not come to all Android phones as expected. Instead, Google offers them to the benefit of Google One subscribers, effectively putting them behind a payroll wall along with what Google says is “the new effects of machine learning.”

google pictures paid features IDG

Some Google Photos features are locked behind a Pixel or Google One payroll wall.

By permission, these aren’t great features, and most people may not care whether you have them. Google Photos is a few steps removed from Android. But Google’s decision to put them behind a paywall suggests a move on how the company will deal with future Android app and system updates.

The Pixel as a platform

The Google Pixel phone itself seems to be turning into a service. Ever since its release in 2016, the house brand has been a showcase for the latest software and hardware enhancements from Google. It started with the Pixel Launcher and Google Search bar widget, and continues through the latest Pixel Feature Drops, which bring new system and app features to Google’s own phone before reaching other vendors ’phones.

The Portrait Blur feature that is now part of Google One, for example, was unveiled by the first Pixel Feature Drop in December, 2019. It has always been free for Pixel owners , but it has always technically been a paid feature.

pixel camera 5 Michael Simon / IDG

The Pixel phones were never about the hardware, but it’s even smaller than that now.

Android features also seem to be a priority for the lineup of Google phones, rather than the specs or screens of the phones themselves. Things like 5G and wireless charging are nice, but that’s not what makes the Pixel a great phone. This is the purest experience without Android, which you will not find anywhere else. Whether you pay $ 699 for the Pixel 5 or $ 349 for the Pixel 4a, you’re buying into a platform. And now Google might want to sell it to everyone else as well.

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