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Google Wallet app on Android now requires that you grant the location permission to get “detailed receipts” with addresses and maps. A detailed receipt includes merchant (store) name and address displayed on a map, with a Call shortcut also available. Previously, this was included by default, but Google Wallet made a change in late July/early August. My transactions in the past week don’t show the map card, just the cost, day/date, statement, and transaction ID. In place of where the map usually would be, there’s a prompt: “Get detailed receipts, like merchant name and address, for future tap to pay transactions.” If you tap “Set up location settings,” Google Wallet walks you through enabling the “Precise location” permission “While using the app.” Select a card and open your most recent receipt to start the process. Enabling location just brings back the old map, with no other updates to Google Wallet receipts. After enabling, past transactions that lack location will not retroactively get the map after granting the permission. Ideally, Google Wallet would notify users ahead of time about this change, so that they can enable it before missing the map on any of their last 10 payments. Overall, asking explicitly for location permission is always nice for privacy.

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Google Pay is getting a handful of updates today centered around Chrome autofill, like expanded card benefit details. Last year, Chrome’s autofill dropdown menu started showing credit card reward details to help you decide which payment method to use for a transaction. For example, you might see “1.5% cash back” or “3x points on flights” alongside a photo of the card and full name. Desktop and mobile Chrome now supports over 100 credit cards in the US after initially working with American Express and Capital One. In addition to Affirm and Zip, Klarna, Afterpay, and other providers will appear as “buy now, pay later” (BNPL) options in Chrome autofill. “Pay over time options” will appear beneath credit/debit cards in the menu. You’re then presented with a list of the various options, and can continue from there with a virtual card generated for this purchase. To make “global money transfer easier,” wallet.google.com and Google Search (when you look up currency exchange rates) will “show straightforward fee and exchange rate information with remittance providers like Ria Money Transfer, Xe and Wise.” “Compare quotes & send money” appears below the chart with the ability to specify the amount. In the Wallet website, there’s a new “International transfers” page. Google will also let you send funds with those services “from the U.S. to India, Brazil, Mexico and the Philippines.” …with Stripe processing the funding transaction. This is still in testing and coming soon.

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Google is rolling out a new feature called “Preferred Sources” in the U.S. and India, which allows users to select their preferred choice of news sites and blogs to be shown in the Top Stories section of Google’s search results. Enabling this feature means you will see more content from the sites you like, the company says. When users search for a particular topic, they will see a “star” icon next to the Top Stories section. They can tap on that icon and start adding sources by searching for them. Once you select the sources, you can refresh the results to see more content from your selected sources. Google said that for some queries, users will also see a separate “From your sources” section below the Top Stories section. This feature enables users to get information from sources they like, but that would also likely trap them in an ideological bubble without exposing them to different points of view on a particular topic. Google debuted this feature as a Search Labs feature on an experimental basis, so users had to opt in to enable it.  The company said that during the test phase, more than half of the users selected four or more sources. Now, the company is making it available to all users for English language searches in the U.S. and India.

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While Google Wallet and Apple Wallet are similar in nature, they have several key differences that make one stand out over the other. Google Wallet has custom cards.  Not all card types or passes are supported by digital wallet apps, such as those for your local library, gym, or coffee shop. That’s where Google Wallet’s “Everything Else” feature comes in handy. It enables you to add a custom card to your Google Wallet for use on the go. If the card has a QR code, Google Wallet can scan it and add it to the custom card. While the custom card might not fully replace the physical card, it offers a convenient way to store and access information like a loyalty card number or QR code when necessary. Wider compatibility across devices. While Apple Wallet does sync across your Apple devices, its compatibility isn’t nearly as extensive as Google Wallet. Google Wallet works with Pixels, of course, as well as Samsung, Motorola, OnePlus, and many other Android brands. I hope someday I can open Google Wallet on my iPhone or use Apple Wallet on my Pixel. Until then, Google Wallet’s broader device support makes it more accessible and versatile. Nearby pass notifications. This feature  lets you enable notifications for a specific card or pass when you’re in an area where it can be used. Although not all cards support it yet, it’s a helpful addition, and once more widely adopted, it will be very convenient. You can easily manage Google Wallet online. By visiting wallet.google.com and signing in to your Google account linked to Google Wallet, you can easily handle all your stored cards. Google Wallet’s website allows you to add or remove payment methods, loyalty cards, passes, and gift cards, as well as view your recent transactions. While you can do all this on your smartphone, using your PC is very convenient, especially if you want to review any transactions or update multiple cards.

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While most wallet apps, like Samsung Wallet, let you store cards and even digital keys, Google Wallet offers features you don’t often see in other wallet apps. You can store your passport, various IDs, including your driver’s license, loyalty cards, and hotel keys, all within the Google Wallet app. While these features are already impressive, another feature completely changes how the app is used and it might be useful for you too. You can favorite frequently used cards and passes, but if you’re like me and use a mix of both, you’re still stuck hunting through the list. The  Nearby Passes notification feature in Google Wallet uses your device’s location and the cards or passes in your wallet to surface the right one at the right time. For example, say you have a loyalty card for a coffee shop near your place. Google Wallet, using your device’s location, sends a notification to your phone’s lock screen so you can access that card instantly, without opening the app or scrolling through everything. The only catch is that it’s not always activated by default, particularly on devices that have had Google Wallet installed for a while or are running an older version of Android. Thankfully, you can activate it easily on your phone. In addition to the feature mentioned above, another Google Wallet feature I’ve been using a lot is the ability to create a loyalty card or pass, even for items that aren’t natively supported by the app. You can manually add unsupported passes to the app. So, if you need to access a card but don’t have your physical wallet on hand, this can be incredibly useful. It’s a lifesaver and allows you to create a centralized place to store all your passes.

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Apple is behind Google in the race to add artificial intelligence (AI) features to smartphones, according to Wall Street Journal Personal Tech Columnist Nicole Nguyen. An iPhone user, Nguyen wrote that her experience with Google’s upcoming Pixel 10 showed that Google has “lapped” Apple as both companies work to develop the “killer AI-powered phone.” Nguyen highlighted the Pixel 10’s AI-powered ability to surface information when needed, provide translations via a real-time voice clone and transcript, coach users to take good photos, and edit photos that have already been taken. “The race continues and for now, Apple has a lot of catching up to do,” Nguyen wrote. Apple faces the risk of its iPhone becoming a commodity because the Pixel 9 has, and Pixel 10 will ship with, embedded AI that lets users speak, search, transact and navigate with a native AI experience. The risk is how many consumers will keep waiting around for Apple to deliver. It’s a massive pain to switch from iOS to Android devices, and most people don’t. Getting an AI-powered Android device just may be enough for people to dump their iPhones.

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Google is making it easier than ever for potential iPhone converts to make the jump to Pixel 10 and switch allegiances over to Android. If you pre-order or purchase a Pixel 10 series handset directly from the Google Store, you’ll receive a helpful email that prepares your iPhone data for transfer. This will include passwords from iOS, other wallet items, and app data. It’ll do this even before your new phone arrives. Once you have your new Pixel 10 in hand, the support continues. If you’re new to Android, your Pixel 10 will provide contextual tips as you use it, guiding you through basic functions like taking a screenshot or turning the device off. Most of that is not new, but it might help those not familiar with the intricacies of Android make that daunting jump over from the mess that is Liquid Glass on iPhone. To simplify things further, the upgraded My Pixel app works in tandem with these features to get you up to speed quickly. When combined, these tools aim to make your switch as effortless as possible, so you can start enjoying your new device without any stress. You can also stay connected with your friends and family using RCS in Google Messages, no matter what phone they have. A new on-device, AI-powered agent is also available to provide instant support and help troubleshoot issues. This agent can seamlessly hand you off to a live customer support representative if you need further assistance. It’s up to Google now to convince people to switch from iPhone to the Pixel 10, but maybe this might give people an easier “out” from Apple if they want it.

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 Google’s Android head has confirmed that ChromeOS is being combined with the company’s mobile platform. Sameer Samat, President of the Android Ecosystem, noted the usage of Apple’s typical ecosystem of products — including a MacBook Pro and an Apple Watch — before finally acknowledging the writing on the wall with ChromeOS. The only real hint comes from Samat’s curiosity over, as he says, how people currently use their laptops to get work done. That could hint at a focus towards providing more robust app support on this combined platform.  This move comes with plenty of questions for current ChromeOS users, including how their laptops will adapt to this new platform and if the move to Android will change the typical decade-long support window provided by Google and various Chromebook OEMs. It could also cause plenty of headaches for enterprise users, especially schools, depending on how the rollout is conducted. It doesn’t sound like the move is right around the corner, of course — to reiterate, there’s nothing here that would really constitute real details. But with ChromeOS feeling stagnant at times and ARM laptops having a bit of a moment, it feels like there’s no better time than the present to enact this sort of shift.

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Apple has been granted a newly revised patent that in part describes embedding a camera and flash within a display. “Electronic devices with two-stage displays,” is concerned with producing a screen that has layers of different display technologies. It’s ostensibly for any conceivable device with a screen — and Apple lists the broadest possible range of those — but much of the patent describes the Apple Watch. “An electronic device may be provided with a two-stage display,” it says. “The display may have an inner layer with a pixel array for displaying images and an outer layer formed from a light modulator with an array of cells that can each be placed in a transparent mode or a light-blocking mode.” The patent describes having first a type of fast-reacting display that is capable of showing video. Then on top of that there could be a second display layer that’s typically used to show slow-changing images, such as text. That layer could be effectively turned off to allow users to see the video on the layer below, or it could be turned on to change the appearance of the device. In that case, a camera shutter “may have an appearance that matches the housing of the electronic device.” “When it is desired to capture images, control circuitry in the electronic device may temporarily place the shutter in a transparent mode to allow light from a flash and/or light being imaged by the camera to pass,” continues the patent.

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Google has added a feature to make it easier for Gmail users to unsubscribe from emails. The company’s recently announced “Manage subscriptions” tool lets users view and manage subscription emails, to make it easy to unsubscribe from the ones they don’t want from a single place. “It can be easy to feel overwhelmed by the sheer volume of subscription emails clogging your inbox: Daily deal alerts that are basically spam, weekly newsletters from blogs you no longer read, promotional emails from retailers you haven’t shopped in years can quickly pile up,” Chris Doan, director of Gmail, wrote on the Google blog. Google’s move is part of a larger trend, with customers seeking more control, more meaningful content and greater value from their brand interactions. “If email doesn’t meet that standard, people now have a faster and easier way to walk away,” Omar Merlo, an associate professor of marketing strategy at Imperial College London told. “This isn’t the end of email marketing. It is perhaps the end of sloppy email marketing.”

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