Tired of juggling between WhatsApp, messages and others? Google prepares its solution
Like all tech players, Google knows: to communicate with each other, we use many messaging services, in addition to iPhone. Some people use traditional SMS, increasingly replaced by their enriched counterparts responding to RCS protocol. Others – one could say “almost all”, since they are two billion monthly active users in the world – employ Whatsappsome swear by the private messages of Instagram, by Messenger (you will note the weight of the Meta apps, which holds these last three services). Let us not forget Snapchat, Signal, Telegram, the DM of social networks and undoubtedly many applications that do not come to mind here. In short, there are plethora of means to exchange messages on smartphones, and it is easy to tangle the pencils when you go from one to the other. The subject did not seem to escape the Google teams, who are working on a practical solution in theory, but not obvious to set up.
“Besties” in the spotlight
There would therefore be more effective than making certain contacts your favorites, which is for example possible in Google Messages and WhatsApp. The American firm works on an option whose name does not seem to be frozen yet, but which would take that of Besties (Best friends in English) or vips. This function was spotted some six months ago per 9TO5 Google. Android Authority Last January, this time under the name of vips. It now reappears in the WhatsApp application, or rather in its numbered beta version 2.25.3.22, where we can see that the mention is said com.whatsapp.pixel.Besties.Provider.pixelbestiespicontentProvider. The functionality would therefore be reserved for pixel smartphones – we imagine it inaugurated within the Pixel 9a to come – and would also make its debut in the next QPR (quarterly update) of Android. This is a lot of conditional, it is appropriate, but it must be said that the regular mention of Pixel Besties and its appearance within a third -party application indicate that the site is indeed in progress at Mountain View.
As you can see, Pixel Besties would identify, in at least a first application outside Google ecosystem, “best friends”. Another mention in the last beta of WhatsApp (com.Google.Android.Apps.pixel.relationships) refers to a Pixel Relationship application, which allows you to glimpse the interest of the whole. We therefore expect that a specific application be dedicated to chosen contacts, and centralizes for each of them the messages received, the last calls, but also the latest locations (in case of sharing) and, potentially, Media related to them (photos and videos, for example). Now it remains to be seen if other services apply to welcome Besties, so that the functionality takes on its full meaning.
