Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Mobile
  3. News

Android Instant Apps and Progressive Web Apps load instantly on your phone

Instant Apps hit Google Play Store, where you can try them before you download

Julian Chokkattu
Kyle Wiggers
By and

instant apps
Pretty much every company has an app, these days. Want a new camera? Get one through B&H’s app. Hoping to avoid the meter maid’s wrath? Check your balance through a parking app. Apps provide a decent experience for the most part, but there’s one big problem with them: They’re often unnecessary. Most of the time, a website is just as good.

But since apps show no sign of decline, Google developed a workaround. It’s called Android Instant Apps, and it launched in the Play Store, Google’s App Store for Android, on October 19.

Instant Apps download small, runnable partitions that start much faster than full-blown apps. When you tap an Instant App URL, the app opens in seconds as the rest of the website downloads in the background. It offers the app experience even for those you don’t want to have installed on your device.

Related

The Play Store’s implementation lets you try apps before you download them. In the app listings of developers who’ve taken advantage, a Try It Now button launches the Instant Apps version of the app.

Google took the wraps off Instant Apps last year, at I/O 2016, and formally announced an Instant Apps software development kit (SDK) at a session on Google’s Mountain View, California, campus in May.

Developers have to upgrade their existing apps to implement Android Instant App’s features, but it’s well worth the effort.

Ellie Powers, Google Play product manager, said that the company’s partners, which include HotPads, Jet, the New York Times, Vimeo, and One Football, have launched 50 instant apps so far, and that some have seen double-digit increases in purchases and videos watched as a result.

“As a developer, you won’t need to build a new, separate app,” Powers wrote in a blog post. “It’s the same Android APIs, the same project, the same source code. You’ll simply update your existing Android app to take advantage of Instant Apps functionality. In fact, it can take less than a day to get up and running for some developers, though the effort involved will vary depending on how your app is structured.”

Instant Apps go hand-in-hand with Google’s Progressive Web Apps (PWA) effort. In the coming months, users will be able to add a link to PWAs — web apps that behave like native apps, in essence — to their devices’ home screens, app drawers, settings menus, and notifications. They’re under 1MB in size, and about 10 to 20 times smaller than the average Android app.

As of October 2017, Instant App are available on the “latest Android devices” in more than 40 countries. They’re only compatible with phon s and tablets that support Google Play Services, which rules out customized devices like Amazon’s Fire HD tablets. But Google says it’ll work to expand compatibility in the coming months.

Update: Added news of Instant Apps on Google Play. 

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
6 years later, the iPhone X still does one thing better than the iPhone 14 Pro
iPhone X.

I’ve been an iPhone user since the very beginning, starting with the original iPhone. You know, the one with the 3.5-inch display that was perfect at the time, making it super easy to use a phone with one hand? As the years go by, the iPhone — and every other smartphone out there — just get bigger and bigger. We now have phones that with almost 7-inch displays, and honestly, I don’t understand how anyone can comfortably use these giant phones — especially if you have smaller hands!

With the iPhone, we’ve gone from 3.5-inch to 4-inches, then 4.7-inches to 5.8-inches, and now the standard 6.1-inch and 6.7-inch of the iPhone 14/iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Plus/iPhone 14 Pro Max, respectively. I personally use an iPhone 14 Pro as my primary device, and while I have gotten used to the 6.1-inch size over the past few years, I still think it’s too big. In fact, the last perfect size iPhone was the iPhone XS with the 5.8-inch display ... and I really wish Apple would bring it back.
5.8 inches was a perfect middle ground

Read more
Google Pixel 8: all the latest rumors and what we want to see
Google Pixel 8 leaked render.

The Google Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro are on their way. Google's fallen in a pretty reliable release pattern for Pixel phones, meaning we can safely expect a new lineup of flagship Pixels each year. In 2023, that means the Pixel 8 and 8 Pro.

The Google Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro are two excellent devices -- possibly two of the best smartphones Google has ever made. But while they have some serious strengths, a number of problems and missed opportunities drag both phones down. This wouldn't be a problem if the competition was standing still, but it's not. The Apple iPhone 14 Pro refreshed the iPhone design for the first time in years, and the recently released Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra is quite possibly one of the best smartphones ever created. So what's a humble Pixel to do?

Read more
Qualcomm’s new Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2 is big news for cheap phones
Hand holding up a smartphone against a city background with Qualcomm Snapdragon7+ Gen 2 logo.

Qualcomm has taken the wraps off its Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2, the next generation of its midrange mobile platform. The new chip is designed to deliver powerful entertainment experiences and performance gains to a broader range of smartphones.

The new platform is an evolution of last year’s Snapdragon 7 Gen 1, which was already a leap beyond the older Snapdragon 700 series it replaced. It began closing the gap with the premium Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 — a trend that continues with this year’s Snapdragon 7+ Gen 2.

Read more