Google’s Chromecast ‘Preview Program’ will provide you early access to new features

Lately, Google has been more often letting its customers beta test different software features before they roll out to the masses. Now, according to a new Chromecast support post, Google will soon let anyone enroll their Chromecast into a “Preview Program” for access to early and unreleased features…

The support page that was spotted this morning claims that users who join the preview program will be able to try new features, give feedback directly back to the Chromecast team, and will be emailed every time a new update rolls out to the streaming device.

According to the support page, you will be able to use the Google Cast app to enroll in the preview program by following the steps below:

1. From your Android or iOS device, open the Google Cast app.
2. Tap the DEVICES tab to see your available Chromecast devices.
3. Scroll to find the device card for the Chromecast you’d like to enroll in the Preview Program.
4. In the top right corner of the device card, tap the device card menu .
5. Tap Device Settings.
6. Tap Preview Program.  If you don’t see Preview Program, we aren’t accepting new members at this time. Please continue to check back as opportunities become available.
7. Choose whether to receive email notifications by moving the slider to the right or left. Note: We recommend allowing email notifications so you’ll know when new updates are pushed to your Chromecast device.
8. If you opt-in to email notifications, you’ll be asked to sign into your Google account if you haven’t already.
9. Review the contents of that page, and tap Join Program.
10. Review the contents of the page, then tap OK, GOT IT. 

Although the preview program option is not yet live in the Google Cast application, we expect that there will soon be either a server-side update or perhaps a full app update to allow enrollment.

Interestingly, Google says that this program is not a beta program and that the company’s “intention is that Preview Program updates will be of the same quality as production version updates.” So you should be able to enroll in this program with no worries of anything breaking.