One of the unique features of the Google Pixel devices that is exclusive and rather nicely done, is the fingerprint gesture that allowed you to swipe down on the fingerprint sensor to open up the notification shade. That useful feature was recently confirmed as not coming to the Nexus devices which are going to be updated to Android 7.1 Nougat, which includes the Nexus 5X and the Nexus 6P that are currently running on the Android 7.1 Developer Preview. Although the fingerprint swipe gesture won’t be part of those devices natively, it’s apparently possible to get fingerprint swipe gestures on mostly any Android phone so long as it meets the requirements.
This works by way of an application that you can install on your device, and for your phone to be compatible it has to be running on Android 6.0 Marshmallow and have a fingerprint sensor. This is also an app which you can’t pick up from the Play Store, so you’ll have to make sure that you have the “unknown sources” box checked to allow apps to be installed that come from outside of the Play Store.
The app, which is simply called Fingerprint Quick Action, only weighs in at about 2.2MB in size so it isn’t a large app that will take up a lot of space on your device, which is always a good thing. Once the app is installed, you can open it up to configure the capability and then set the gesture to swipe down on the fingerprint sensor to bring down the notification shade. It is noted that it will not work with all phones that have a fingerprint sensor on them, so if you’re interested in having this feature you’ll simply have to test it out and see if it works. The only detail that was given in regards to compatibility, is that devices with a fingerprint sensor that is part of a capacitive home button may not work. Having said that, devices like the Nexus 5X and Nexus 6P should be able to use this app as they have fingerprint sensors on the back of the device which don’t act as a home button.
Download Fingerprint Quick Action APK