As announced in December, Apple TV is now available globally on the Chromecast with Google TV. The new app allows you to watch original Apple TV+ content, as well as access existing iTunes movie and television show purchases.

Google launched Crisis Map eight years ago as a way to visualize emergency and weather-related data.  In an email to users, the company announced today that its shutting down the standalone website next month. 

As more and more students use Google Classroom, the portal is adding an offline mode on Android for those with limited internet connectivity. There are also a number of other improvements to the mobile apps and management experience.

Google’s rebrand of G Suite to Workspace in October first rolled out to businesses, with the promise that personal and nonprofits users would follow later. Google Workspace for Education is rolling out next with more editions that better suit the needs of schools from pre-K to the PhD level.

As distance learning continues, Google Meet is rolling out a handful of new features, including emoji reactions to help students better express themselves and more moderation controls for teachers.

Ahead of upcoming Australian legislation that would require payment for linking, Google signed a three-year partnership with News Corp that will bring publications from three countries into News Showcase.

Most people primarily experience Material Design in Android apps, while web adoption is mostly limited to Google’s first-party sites. A new Material Design for WordPress plugin, which Google currently calls an experiment, possibly opens up the look to many more pages and blogs.

Back in October, Google officially dropped support for its virtual reality platform with Android 11. Daydream is no longer receiving updates, and now can no longer access the Google Play Store or other VR discovery features. 

The vast majority of Google’s iOS apps have not been updated since early December. A trio of smaller Google applications saw new versions towards the end of last month, while YouTube for iPhone and iPad was just updated this evening.

If you’re not using security keys, the Google Prompt is the next best two-factor authentication method to protect accounts. Google is now updating the Prompt’s Android UI with a much-needed dark theme. 

Recently, instead of using classic Chrome Custom Tabs, the Google app for Android began using a bespoke in-app browser for search results and more. Now the in-app browser for Google Search on Android is testing handy shortcuts to “Read Aloud” and “Translate.”

Google One primarily serves to give you more storage space for Gmail, Drive, and Photos. Last year, the subscription added a VPN and is now providing all Android users with access to “enhanced” Google Photos editing tools and filters that were previously only available on Pixel phones.

The search bar in Gmail is already a powerful tool, especially when using the advanced filters, and will now show associated email aliases in results.

After initially launching in Australia, the brand-new Google News Showcase has officially launched in the UK and Argentina.

As of last year, downloading certain apps from the Play Store on Chrome OS would automatically “install” the Progressive Web App. The latest service to follow this PWA approach is YouTube Music, though Google is taking a circuitous route with a separate Chromebook listing.

Last year, the Google app on Android ditched Chrome Custom Tabs when opening Discover articles and Search results. Google has now redesigned the custom in-app browser with a bottom bar to make it easier to navigate.

The latest Google app beta is rolling out a redesign to the player screen in Google Podcasts. Simplification is the focus with more spacing given to key controls, while other actions are hidden in the process.

In general, there are two ways to Cast content on desktop Chrome. The browser can send your current window, or some services feature a native capability that just transfers the video stream to a bigger screen. YouTube TV’s web app used to have the latter Cast functionality, but it’s now gone due to a bug.

While we’re well into the new year, YouTube Music looks to be taking another stab at giving users a 2020 Year in Review. Hopefully, this iteration will be widely rolled out.

Google Play Music stopped working at the start of December, but the files you uploaded to the cloud locker and other data remain available for export. That will be changing later in February when Google deletes all information associated with Play Music.

Google has a $1 billion plan to pay publishers for content that appears in a cross-service “News Showcase” product. This is the company’s preferred route to support journalism, and comes as it’s locked in a dispute with Australia over an upcoming requirement to essentially “pay for links.” Google News Showcase was just surprisingly announced for Australia.