What exactly is AirDrop-style sharing capability?
It’s very easy to send and receive files between two iPhones or two Android phones. In the first case, you can use AirDrop, whereas in the second case, you can rely on Quick Share. But the real struggle starts when you want to move data from an iPhone to an Android or vice versa.I, personally, used to rely on the WhatsApp method – asking my friends to send the videos or images via WhatsApp. And if there was a bulk of data, I simply used to upload it to my Google Drive and then share its link with my friends. While both these features eventually do the job, neither of them is convenient.
To make transferring items between iOS and Android easier, Google made Quick Share compatible with AirDrop. For instance, if you want to move a file from Android to iPhone, you first need to make sure that AirDrop is enabled on the iPhone.
Then, use Quick Share the way you generally use it to share files with any Android device. The iPhone will appear under the “Send to nearby devices” section. Tap it, and the file will be sent to the iPhone.
The feature was initially exclusive to the Pixel 10 series. However, the tech giant later made it available to the Pixel 9 lineup as well. It’s also available on the Samsung Galaxy S26 series.
It’s coming to more devices
List of phones compatible with AirDrop-style sharing. | Image by Google
Samsung isn’t the only non-Pixel brand that has received this very useful feature. You can find it on the recently released Oppo Find X9 phones and the Oppo Find N6 as well. It’s also available on the Vivo X300 Ultra.Interestingly, Google yesterday announced a few other smartphones on which this capability will be rolled out soon. This list includes the Galaxy S25 and S24 lineups, Z Fold 7, Z Flip 7, Z Fold 6, Z Flip 6, Z TriFold, the Oppo Find X8 line, the OnePlus 15, the Honor Magic V6, and the Honor Magic 8 Pro.
The interesting thing to note in the list is the availability of this feature in the Pixel phones. It’s present in the Pixel 10 and Pixel 9 lineups and the Pixel 8a.
Yes, you read that right. AirDrop-style sharing can be found on the Pixel 8a but not on the standard Pixel 8 or the premium Pixel 8 Pro.
This has created a sense of frustration among the Pixel 8 users, and it can be spotted in online forums like Reddit. A user was so angry about this decision that they commented that they would switch to a different smartphone brand.
There’s fortunately a workaround
In addition to sharing the names of all the compatible devices, the Mountain View giant also announced a workaround that you can use if your phone isn’t compatible with the feature. What you need to do is generate a QR code using Quick Share on your non-compatible Android device. After that, you need to scan the QR code with the iPhone to share the file via the cloud.
The announcement post mentions that this ability has started to roll out to all the Android phones and will become available to everyone within the next month.
It’s really disappointing news
While I personally don’t have a Pixel 8, I can understand how annoying it is to know that your sibling who isn’t as powerful as you is getting an upgrade you actually deserve. The most surprising part is that the Pixel 8a, Pixel 8, and Pixel 8 Pro all come with the Tensor G3 chipset, so nobody really knows why Google has shown discrimination among the different models of the Pixel 8 family. From what I believe, the company might have used the release year as the cutoff instead of the processor used in the phones.The standard and the Pro variants were released in 2023, whereas the A model was launched in 2024. So it might be possible that 2024 has been set as the cutoff. Well, we can only make assumptions, as there isn’t any official information on this.
All that said, some Reddit users also believe that this feature will eventually roll out to more Pixel devices soon through a future OTA update. Whether it will actually happen or not remains to be seen.
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