Summary
- Google’s mobile payment services have undergone multiple rebrandings and feature shifts, resulting in a confusing history with Google Wallet and Google Pay.
- Currently, Google Wallet primarily functions as a digital wallet for storing and using payment cards, loyalty cards, and passes for contactless payments, but it has lost its person-to-person money transfer feature in most countries.
- Person-to-person money transfer via Google Pay is now only available in Singapore and India; users in other countries must rely on alternative services like Venmo or PayPal.
It may be convenient to use your phone for mobile payments, but not when you need to pay a real person in your life. Google Wallet is one method you can use for this. Well, it used to be, and kinda still is? Maybe.
What Happened to Google Pay?
Google is not known for neat and tidy handling of services with competing features. That’s particularly noticeable in the saga of Google Pay and Google Wallet. These two brand names have been used multiple times for different things. It’s a bit of a mess.
In 2011, Google launched a service called “Google Wallet.” It was a service primarily for sending money to people, and it included a physical debit card that you could easily reload with money. Before phones could do tap-to-pay, this was a neat idea–though it hardly reinvented the wheel.
A few years later, tap-to-pay started to take off, and Google launched “Android Pay.” This was the first iteration of Google’s NFC mobile payment platform for Android devices. Google Wallet continued to exist separately until it was absorbed into a single service called “Google Pay” in 2018.
Then, in 2020, Google Pay received a massive update with a handful of new, exciting features. One of those features was the ability to send money to friends and family, essentially Google’s version of Venmo. But then, in 2022, the NFC mobile payments part was split out into a separate app called…”Google Wallet” again.
We’re not done yet. In 2024, Google Pay was officially shut down in all but two countries: Singapore and India. All of those cool new features, like sending money to friends, are gone. Only Google Wallet remains today.
What Can Google Wallet Do?
So, Google Wallet can’t send money to friends and family anymore, but what can it do? Think of it like a digital wallet, allowing you to store and use various cards and passes on your Android device. This includes credit and debit cards for tap-to-pay transactions, as well as loyalty cards, transportation passes, event tickets, and even vaccine records.
The primary purpose of Google Wallet now is contactless payments in physical stores and online checkouts. In stores, it works with any contactless reader displaying the Apple Wallet, Google Wallet/Pay, or tap-to-pay icon. For online purchases, simply look for the Google Pay or Google Wallet buttons at checkout.
Google Wallet is exclusive to Android devices. This is due to iPhone restrictions that prevent third-party apps from utilizing the device’s tap-to-pay functionality. However, there’s not much functional difference between Apple Pay and Google Pay–they’re accepted at the same places.
It’s a real shame that Google Wallet no longer has the ability to send money to people in most countries. iPhone users have this functionality with a feature of Apple Pay called “Apple Cash.” People with iPhones can send and receive money through iMessage or the Wallet app. That’s a great convenience that Android users no longer have.
How to Send Money to Friends and Family
As mentioned briefly above, Google Pay–the app that had the ability to send money to people like Venmo–still exists alongside Google Wallet in only two countries: Singapore and India. These are the only two places where Google still maintains this functionality.
If you are lucky enough to live in one of those places, here’s how you can use Google Pay to send money to friends and family:
- Open the Google Pay app.
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Under “People,” tap the contact you want to pay. If you can’t find the contact:
- Tap “+ New Payment.”
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In the search bar, enter one of the following:
- Contact’s name
- Phone number
- Email address
- Select the contact you want to pay.
- At the bottom, tap “Pay.” Make sure the recipient’s name and phone number are correct.
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Tap “Next.”
- Optional: Enter a note to describe your payment, then tap “Done. ”
- Tap the bank account you want to pay from or add a bank account.
- Tap “Proceed to Pay.”
For people everywhere else in the world, you simply can’t use Google to send money in this way. The company doesn’t offer any Venmo-like solution. So, that’s exactly what you’ll need to use: Venmo, Paypal, Cash App, etc.
