Google Play Store Introduces New Collections Feature for Enhanced User Experience

Google reveals plan to transform the Play store from an open-air bazaar to a premium shopping mall

Google seems intent on renovating that sometimes chaotic shopping experience into something more welcoming and organized -- and somewhere, the tech giant hopes you will spend a lot more time. To think about it in physical terms, the Google Play store is like a massive, underregulated open-air bazaar. It has countless games, apps, movies, TV shows, books, and more. There are amazing deals to be found if you look hard enough. Meanwhile, other apps are decidedly more buyer-beware -- threatening to "steal sensitive information and login credentials from unsuspecting Android owners," as Laptop Mag reported in May. Google seems intent on renovating that sometimes chaotic shopping experience into something more welcoming and organized -- and somewhere, the tech giant hopes you will spend a lot more time. It seems the Play store will dramatically change in 2024 and 2025. The updates began in earnest this month when the company announced that scores of sketchy or low-quality apps would be removed from the store on August 31. Google wants to "ensure apps meet uplifted standards for the Play catalog," the company has announced. App removal is the first part of the renovation job. The second part was revealed on Tuesday to reporters inside Google's warehouse-styled New York offices on the west side of Manhattan. Google product managers and one marathon-wary executive showed off the new features coming to the Play Store this week and later this month. Sam Bright, Google Play's Vice President and General Manager, introduced how Google Play would expand "beyond the store" to include new features. "We know that developers have come up with an app for just about every problem, situation, or interest out there," Bright said. "This is an incredible benefit for users, but many users, including myself, have great apps on their phones that sometimes go unused." Bright said that Android app users are happy to have a wealth of apps from which to choose but conceded they need help finding them. Moreover, they don't spend time in the app store. There hasn't been a good enough reason to. "App stores today have become a place where people download an app. And in some cases, they don't visit again until it's time for them to download the next one. We want to change that here in Play," Bright said. "With experiences in Play on your home screen and across apps, we're taking Play from a destination people visit for apps to an end-to-end experience that's more than a store." Below is how the company hopes users will see Play as more than just a store in the months ahead. Like most things with Google, these new features create more opportunities for the company to learn more about its users -- their interests, behaviors, shopping habits, and more -- to gain insights to help it strike deals with retailers and app developers. Among the new features is one called Collections, which launched on Wednesday. Essentially, it groups updates from related apps and presents them in feeds. For example, Bright explained that if you're running a marathon, Collections will group updates from the running app Strava, the fundraising app GoFundMe, and the fitness app MyFitnessTracker into a single feed. If you're a shopper, it will collect updates from your browsing history on apps like Walmart, Adidas, and Best Buy. To start, Google is only sorting apps into seven categories for its Collections feature ("watch," "listen," "read," "game," "food," "shop," and "social"), but there are plans for more ("health & fitness," "travel & events," "sports," and "dating") soon. Users will be able to make their own custom categories in the future -- just not quite yet. If you enjoy being reminded of what's going on in your apps -- because, maybe, like me, you forget you have some apps -- Collections will be a welcome addition to Play. If you're constantly pulling up individual apps all the time, this may not be that much of a game-changer. But Google rarely rolls out initiatives like this without terabytes of data to support it, and the longevity of recommendation-focused features like Google Discover indicates that Collections may be sticky among users. Ting Mui Li, a Google product manager, tells Laptop Mag that eventually, Google Discover content -- aka web pages -- will be recommended in collections if it aligns with the theme of those apps. "Web will come later, and we could totally see being able to give more content suggestions and recommendations for different collections," Li said on Tuesday. For example, if you have the NBA app and the Brooklyn Nets App in your "sports" collection, Google may recommend an article from The Athletic about the Nets in the collection. Another new Play feature is Comics, which signals how Google wants Play to become more than a store through content consumption. Comics is a curated manga and webtoons shop and reader that will first be launched in Japan. Donisha Das, a Google product manager, said users will get personalized recommendations for comics and related content. Das tells Laptop Mag that entertainment could come next, after Comics. As for when this new feature would move beyond comics, Donisha says Google wants to move "pretty fast" onto new iterations. Google Gemini, the generative AI tool that underpinned just about every update the company announced at its annual I/O event a little more than two months ago, is, of course, at the heart of every recommendation that the new Google Play features make (unless you turn it off; more on that below). A throttle against all these personalized recommendations in the new Play (Google reps rarely -- never? -- called it the "Play Store" during various demos) is a personalization feature that helpfully allows you to turn off app personalization suggestions. If you don't want to get suggestions or updates from an app (for example: The toilet paper you were eyeballing in the Walmart app has just been put on sale, and you receive a notification about it), you can turn it off. A Google product manager confirmed that if you don't want to receive recommendations, Google won't show them. However, it will still collect your data about your toilet paper interest. Gaming is also getting several cool upgrades. Google Play Games will enable users to switch seamlessly from their Android device to their computer via the Android app Google Play Games on PC. "You can start a mobile game on your commute and then secure the win at home on your tablet or PC," writes Bright in a post on Google's Keyword Blog published Wednesday. "With our new multi-game capabilities rolling out over the next few weeks, PC gamers can play multiple titles at the same time -- actively competing in one while keeping an eye on resources in another." So, how many games could you play at once? Well, that's likely limited to your computing power, said Google product manager Artem Yudin during a product demo on Tuesday. Related to gaming is the Google Play Points scheme, which is also getting an upgrade. Interestingly, Google is also letting users redeem those points for physical products. Announced in 2019, the points system gets a little more real as users can cash in their points (earned via purchases in the Play store) for physical Google products like a Pixel Watch or Pixel phone. It's easy to imagine how Google, which also released its quarterly earnings on Tuesday, intends to monetize these new features through direct deals or data capture. Li and Das offered the same response to Laptop Mag about the new features: Google wants to launch, see what organically sticks and what users like, and then expand. With the "uplifted" standard Google is implementing and removing violating apps later this summer, plus the rollout of new features to make Google Play a more significant part of your phone, the image of Google Play as an open-air bazaar may soon be replaced by something like a walled garden -- something where an Apple might grow.

Google Play's new Collections widget wants you to spend, consume, and repeat

Finding new Android apps these days can be a real pain. Just opening the Play Store feels like an assault on the senses. Both the Games and Apps tabs fill half of their main displays with sponsored suggestions, neither of which feel notably different from the personalized recommendations you'll find further down these respective pages. With some new features headed to the Play Store this summer, Google is making an attempt to help you find better app recommendations and make the most of the apps you already have installed. As Sam Bright, VP and General Manager of Google Play, put it during a press event attended by Android Police this week, most Android users only open the Play Store whenever they're looking to download a specific app -- and even then, more than 60 percent of those apps go completely unused on Android. So, in an attempt to make the Play Store an actual destination on your phone, Google is leaning hard into new forms of discovery, rewards, and more. Related Interview: Google's new Play Store boss is focused on developers, not lawsuits Android Police spoke to Sam Bright, VP and General Manager of Google Play, in his first public interview since taking the job in early 2023 Collections wants to bring your favorite apps into one place But right now, it mostly feels like a way to spend more money The big announcement today is Collections, which we've heard about for so long in the run-up to an official launch, it was originally known by a completely different name. With Collections, Google is looking to partner with app makers in a way that should, at least in theory, deliver a better experience for end users. But at least right now, it feels like yet another way to get you to "consume content." And how you feel about this extension of the Play Store will really end up depending on how you feel about that phrase in general. Although Collections is launched from a widget on your home screen, the real experience comes once you select from one of the various tabs on-screen. This delivers a full-screen list of every category Collections allows you to browse through -- it's launching with seven, with four more planned for future updates -- including shopping, food, and various entertainment options. The idea here is simple: Collections pulls from the apps already installed on your phone to deliver "personalized" recommendations, inspiring you to use your phone's software more frequently and in new ways. That differentiates it from, say, the sponsored "folders" you'll find on low-end Motorola phones, which frequently attempt to get you to install new apps or games through paid partnerships. The only place you'll find suggestions for services you don't use is within Collections' settings screen, which lists every possible partnership Google has made with apps so far. And, to be clear, these are partnerships. The Watch category, for example, has practically every media service you could possibly name -- even ones I've never heard of -- with one extremely obvious exception. That's right: Disney+, Max, and Peacock are all here, but Netflix is absolutely nowhere to be seen. A footnote in Collections makes it clear that Google is continuing to build out its list of partners, but missing out on one of the only successful streaming services operating at this moment is a big whiff. Close While exploring Collections, I couldn't help but be reminded of Google TV's current home screen, which -- aside from its boatload of ads -- feels like it's constantly trying to push you to try out popular or acclaimed shows and films. To some people, this sort of experience might be worth keeping the widget on your home screen. To me, though, I couldn't help but feel like this is yet another way for my phone to try to get me to spend money and time I really don't have. I don't want to have all of my shopping apps aggregate deals into a single spot. I just want to get off those apps and live a life with slightly less scrolling. But, undoubtedly, that comes down to a difference in priorities between myself and the Play team. Considering the goal that Google set out to achieve here -- to make it easier to see what your already-installed apps have to offer -- I think it's a solid first effort. The combination of customizable categories (Google demoed a "Marathon" combination on stage, consisting of MyFitnessPal, Strava, and GoFundMe) and upcoming auto-categories like Fitness, Sports, and Travel, I think Collections could become a killer tool in the Play Store's arsenal. I'm just not sure it's there just yet. Related The Google Play Store is a dumpster fire and AI won't save it The addition of AI recommendations to the Play Store won't fix how Google prioritizes its whims over user satisfaction Plenty of additional changes are coming to Google Play All in an effort to make download apps feel cool again Of course, Collections isn't the only thing Google is announcing today, though if you've been following recent Play Store evolutions closely, most of the things here won't sound new. Interest filters, for example, should allow Google to deliver better recommendations by allowing you to add specific parameters to your filters within the For You tab. This was recently spotted in an APK teardown, and it's already ready for primetime. The company is also looking to build out both Play Pass and Play Points with new initiatives. New Play Pass subscribers in the US, UK, Australia, Japan, and South Korea can save 80 percent on their first three months, while Play Points is continuing to roll out new ways to reward members with products from Pixel through "Super Weekly Prizes." Diamond, Platinum, and Gold members can try to score a free Pixel Watch or Pixel Buds Pro by checking out the perks tab in the app. Something that is brand new -- albeit not currently planned for a US release -- are AI-powered curated spaces within the Play Store. Google already tried out a pilot experience with cricket in India, and with its latest collection, it's jumping to Japan. The company has partnered with manga and webtoon publishers to deliver a space for fans to browse every suggested app and even check out first-chapter previews. Presumably, this is headed to the US at some point, though it's unclear what form it'll take. Google, if you're reading this, football season is right around the corner. Make it happen (and go Bills). Finally, Play Games on PC continues to be one of Google's favorite pet projects. With over 3,500 games now supported, an update rolling out over the next few weeks will allow the most dedicated gamers to multitask, keeping one game in the foreground while another continues uninterrupted in the background. If you play any sort of title where "harvesting resources" is half of your time spent, Play Games on PC might finally be an essential app. That's a lot of changes to Google Play, and it sounds like the company is far from done from trying to revitalize the experience of finding new apps and games on Android. The heyday of app stores might be long behind us, but that doesn't mean we can't hope to recapture just a little bit of that magic. Related 5 things the Google Play Store desperately needs to improve Ads galore, poor quality control, and fake reviews make up a few of Google's issues