Well, it looks like it’s finally happening. The long-awaited Family Library feature of Google Play Store is finally coming out today. A bit later than expected but the wait was hopefully worth it. Just like its name suggests, this latest feature will give you an easy way of sharing all of your Google Play purchases with all of the devices in your household. After you sign up to use Family Library, Google will ask you for a single credit card that will be used to pay for all purchases made by your family. Naturally, you’ll have the final say in regards to approving the purchases your family members make but you’ll also be able to grant them the option of using their own credit cards and Play Store gift cards. Don’t want to share your entire Play Store library with your family? That’s not a problem either as you can manually include and exclude each and every purchase you’ve made from the sharing program.
The program extends beyond your own account’s library as you can also choose which Play Store purchases made by your family members will be shared with the rest of the household. Furthermore, the Family Library also supports iOS devices to a degree as it can sync purchased movies, TV shows, and books to iPhones, iPods, and iPads in your household. Naturally, Play Store apps are exclusive to Android devices even if their iOS ports exist on the App Store. The Family Library service officially launched earlier today but it doesn’t have a universal global release. Instead, it’s gradually rolling out to different territories worldwide and should be available to everyone by Friday morning.
Unfortunately, this service is still separate from Google Play Music’s family plan which was released in late 2015 and allows up to six family members to stream millions of Play Store songs for $14.99 per month. Google has no plans on joining the two services into one and has actually announced a new expansion of the said music family plan today. More specifically, that music subscription plan will soon be available in 12 countries worldwide as it’s launching in Italy, Ireland, Mexico, and New Zealand by the end of the week.