Megan Ellis / Android Authority
I was showing my dad a couple of Android features on his phone recently, and not for the first time. You might have had this revelation already, but I realized there’s so much we do unthinkingly on our devices that might still be alien to the generations above us. I’m not exactly young myself as a millennial, but I’ve grown up in the digital age, which means I’ve picked up new tricks as they’ve come on the scene. Writing about them for a living helps quite a lot, too.
But for my parents, these little Android features look like magic at times, and some of them can actually be game-changers. I’ve had to guide them through a couple of the tips more than once, but they’ve adopted many of them since. They’ve even impressed their friends with their newfound modern wizardry on occasion.
Here are the most useful Android features I taught my parents to use. Some of them might be worth showing yours, too.
Which of these Android features would your parents enjoy most? 232 votes Google Wallet/Google Pay 15 % Do Not Disturb 9 % Quick Share 14 % Camera shortcuts 13 % Gemini 9 % Gboard GIFs 5 % Google Lens 9 % Google Meet screen sharing 6 % Google Maps tips 13 % Live captions 7 %
Google Wallet and Google Pay
Joe Maring / Android Authority
Ok, technically that’s two things, but you can see what I’m getting at. Combining the two is using your Android phone to pay for stuff, and that’s what matters.
I hardly carry a wallet these days because I can tap my phone pretty much everywhere. Recently, I got my dad set up with Google Wallet, and I wasn’t sure how it would go. He had the usual questions about how it works, whether it’s secure, and so on.
Fast-forward a few weeks, and he’s actually using it at the supermarket and restaurants. He still keeps at least one card on him “just in case,” but he’s surprisingly enthusiastic whenever someone asks him about it. If we can get our folks to use Google Wallet regularly, it’s one less thing for them to remember to grab as they leave the house, and that can be quite a big deal as they get on in years.
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