The new features on Google News are designed to help those using Android Go phones or experiencing low internet connectivity. Users will be able to save data by loading images on demand and will also be able to download articles for offline viewing.
Google has announced four new features for Google News to better serve those experiencing low internet connectivity. The new Google News features are also designed for those on low-end Android devices, including Android Go smartphones.
The aim of the new features is that Google News works on all kinds of smartphones, in any network condition. For the same, the company is rolling out four core features to the Google News platform.
First, Google News will open videos on the platform through YouTube Go, an optimised version of YouTube designed for low-end phones including Android Go devices. Google says this will help serve videos in a more lightweight format. Also, videos on Google News will not autoplay, hence saving mobile data.
The second new feature coming to Google News will ensure Newscasts (previews of a story) become more text-focused, instead of relying on heavy images and videos. This feature is once again intended towards saving data.
The third feature addition to Google News for those with low connectivity and entry-level Android devices will see images being compressed. Users will be able to fully load images they want to see with just a tap, hence saving data on loading all images. Videos and GIFs will also not auto-play, leading to less data being cached and saved on device.
Lastly, users will be able to save articles for offline consumption and easily downloaded them over Wi-Fi for reading later.
Google says all these new features will will turn on automatically and will roll out over the coming weeks to users around the world.
Google had refreshed its News platform back in May. Google News now makes use of Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to find relevant news stories and groups them in chronological order with the option of viewing full coverage, local news aggregation and more. You can read more about the new Google News here.
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