Android’s Find My Device network highlights the neglect of UWB

This week, after a long delay, Google finally started rolling out its Find My Device network for Android. This is existing, but it also highlights the fact that Google, and his Android as a whole, have severely neglected his UWB technology.

UWB, or ultra-wideband technology, is nothing new. Used for very short range communication. On a large scale, this is useful for ultra-fast connections in small areas. But while this use case highlights the limitations of the technology, the same weaknesses make UWB particularly good at communicating with nearby devices in a way that lets you know how close objects are to each other.

So UWB is useful for things like your car’s digital key or “tap” to interact with nearby devices. Android supports this kind of usage, but it all depends on the device. This UWB application requires additional hardware beyond the cellular radio. It also depends on what the software can do.

Google hasn’t done much about this.

As it stands, there’s basically nothing you can do with UWB on, say, the Pixel 8 Pro, which supports this technology. That’s despite Google packing the necessary hardware into the Pixel 6 Pro, 7 Pro, and Pixel Fold as well. One of the few places currently being leveraged is Quick Share.

And the same is true for the Find My Device network. Apple’s AirTag has used UWB since day one to help users pinpoint the exact location of lost items, but none of the AirTag-like trackers announced for the Find My Device network have actually does not support his UWB. It’s hard to know what the company’s plans are, as Google hasn’t even mentioned his UWB support for this network yet, although it may change in the future.

However, there are some future developments.

Google has confirmed that Pixel tablets will support “tap to cast” on UWB-compatible Android smartphones starting this year. The Pixel Watch 3 also appears to support technology that better unlocks smartphones when the two are near each other. These are really useful ways to show off and use technology in a way you actually notice.

Of course, Google isn’t the only one guilty here. Back in 2020, Samsung was raving about UWB being a big deal, but not much has happened since then. The company is still only putting the technology in its top-of-the-line smartphones, including the Galaxy SmartTag 2 with UWB (which doesn’t work with the larger Android Find My Device network).

What does the future hold for UWB on Android? hope UWB trackers are the future, but I’d love to see Google start using this technology. It looks like Google is finally starting to use this technology. UWB has a lot of fun applications, many of which Apple already uses, but has been completely ignored.

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