Quick Links
Sharing files between friends and colleagues has gotten plenty easier than passing along floppy disks and thumb drives. Heck, it’s even slicker than taking a run through a cloud service. Apple’sAirDropmay be the most recognized form of wireless peer-to-peer file sharing, but Google and Samsung have had their own separate protocols to serve the Android ecosystem for years. They covered a lot of ground, but they weren’t exactly complementary to each other.
In 2024, the two have joined forces to merge their solutions into a single one called Quick Share. It’s meant to work across devices runningAndroid,ChromeOS, and even Windows.
But what exactly is Quick Share, and how does it work? Let’s break it down.
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The history of Quick Share (and Nearby Share)
To say that Apple carries a massive lead against the Android world with AirDrop is an understatement. After all, AirDrop came out in 2011, and it wasn’t until 2020 that we started hearing that both the Google and Samsung camps weredeveloping their own standards. Google, which previously promoted theNFC-based Android Beamas its local wireless file sharing solution, would come out with Nearby Share and Samsung would bring along Quick Share.
Much like with AirDrop, devices using Nearby Share and Quick Share would send out a low-power wireless signal, usually Bluetooth, to detect file sharing targets. Users would then be able to select their target or targets and initiate a transfer through a regular Bluetooth connection or a direct, high-bandwidth Wi-Fi hookup. No more barebone emails containing small pictures and short links – Quick Share and Nearby Share would let you do it with a couple of taps and no mess left behind.
Each service evolved by expanding support to PCs and refining features. Samsung Quick Share was built to support the Galaxy ecosystem with special features like file transfers via the cloud (limited to a paltry 2GB, later 5GB per day), expiring file shares (Private Share), and a few other touches.
That was until CES 2024, when Google announced it would merge itsNearby Share protocol with Samsung’s Quick Share. The fine details of the combination have yet to fully surface. As of this writing, therollout has just startedand will take some time to reach everyone, but you will notice when that happens because you’ll see a new logo deployed with the service – it’s a circular glyph featuring dueling arrows meeting in the middle. The deployment of a unified Quick Share will likely happen with an update to Google Play services.
Which devices can use Quick Share and how?
If you want to use Quick Share (or Nearby Share, as it remains named on most non-Samsung Android phones), you’ll need to make sure you turn on Bluetooth and Location on your Android 6.0, ChromeOS 91, or newer device. you’re able to also use Quick Share on your Windows 10 or later PC by installingQuick Share for Windows.
Samsung Quick Share is available on Samsung phones and PCs with Android 10 or Windows 10 and later. To be clear, you are able to share between Galaxy and non-Galaxy Android devices via each respective method, but Galaxy-to-Galaxy transactions may still use Samsung’s Quick Share protocol, which has a few extra conditions and features to it. There’s alsoa Samsung Quick Share appfor file transfers to non-Samsung PCs on Windows 10 version 19041 or later.
If you own multiple phones or PCs and would like to use Nearby Share or Quick Share with them, consider assigning them different device names. You will be able to do so in the respective Nearby Share and Quick Share sub-settings menus for each device. In some cases, such as with the Nearby Share for Windows program, you may also change where received files are saved.
How can I toggle device visibility through Quick Share?
Keep in mind that turning on Quick Share not only means you get to seek out and share files with other devices, but that other devices may be able to seek and share files with your device, too. There are four general visibility levels and a couple of sub-settings you should be aware of.
If the Quick Share tile is not already there on your non-Samsung Android, you may need to press anEditbutton or a pencil icon in your Quick Settings panel, then search the tile drawer and drag the appropriate tile up to the active shelf.
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To toggle your Android device’s visibility to other Quick Share users, follow these steps:
With Samsung Quick Share, here’s what you need to do:
On ChromeOS, perform the following:
If you’ve opted to turn it on, you can also select your visibility level while your device is unlocked and your screen is on.
The story on Windows goes like this:
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How to share a file or link using Quick Share
When you are ready to fire over a file, photo, webpage or anything else you might want to share, here’s what you need to do:
How to receive a file using Quick Share
verify your device visibility setting you’ve selected will allow your device to be found by whoever is sharing it. You’ll see the same Quick Share prompt when the sender selects your device to share with.
verify to verify that the PINs match and then pressAccept. If you’re sharing files between devices that are logged into the same Google or Samsung account, your devices will bypass the verification stage.
Sharing apps using Quick Share
Quick Share is useful for much more than just sharing files. If your Android groupies need to hunt for an app – let’s face it, you probably might have to at some point – you can do them a favor by saving them a download and just directly send them the entire app.
