Google is officially launching Nearby Share for Windows, the company’s AirDrop-like tool that lets you send things like documents and photos between your Android device and your PC. The company first released the app for Windows in beta earlier this year.
The official Windows launch of Nearby Share adds some new features
The app launched in beta earlier this year.
The app launched in beta earlier this year.
Image: Google
is a senior reporter covering technology, gaming, and more. He joined The Verge in 2019 after nearly two years at Techmeme.
As part of Wednesday’s launch, Google says Nearby Share now has “improved performance” and some new features: the tool now shows the estimated time for file transfers to finish and shows an image preview in device notifications. Google also says that it’s partnering with companies such as HP to “include the Nearby Share app on select Windows PCs,” which sounds to me like Nearby Share will be preinstalled on those select devices at some point.
If you want to set up Nearby Share on your Windows device now, you can follow our guide.
Google first launched Nearby Share to let you move files between Android devices in 2020, and even then, the feature felt like a major catch-up move; Apple released AirDrop for iOS and macOS all the way back in 2011. Google has also brought Nearby Share to ChromeOS to make it easier to share files between Android devices and Chromebooks.
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