Google’s health-tracking platform Google Fit is set to gain two more useful features soon: paced walking and blood glucose tracking. An APK teardown of the latest version of the Google Fit app for Android has revealed these upcoming features. The folks over at XDA Developersspotted code strings related to these features inside version 2.57.16 of the app that started rolling out via the Play Store recently.
Paced Walking
As the name suggests, this feature will let you set “a pace for your walks”. The app will play a metronome sound effect in the background to help you walk at a set pace. “Follow along with the beat to turn walking into a simple, effective way to exercise,” the description reads.
Google Fit may offer at least four different sound effects for Paced Walking. Each of these has a different tempo and will likely be for a different walking pace a user could select within the app. The code strings reveal that turning on Paced walking will not pause any other music you’re playing on your phone. The sound effects will play in the background.
Once this feature goes live on the Google Fit app, you’ll be able to select it as one of the activities. A new card on the home screen will introduce the feature to users, prompting them to try it out.
Google says “brisk walking is an easy way to fit exercise into your day, and counts towards your activity goals”. According to the company, a brisk walk usually means around 100 steps per minute. It should leave you “a little out of breath.”
Blood Glucose Tracking
Google Fit may also soon add the ability to track your blood glucose level. It’s unclear how this feature would work. But XDA speculates users might be able to manually enter their blood glucose levels and keep a tab on how it changes over time. The Fitbit app also recently added a similar feature.
According to the report, the Fit API already supports the blood glucose data type, allowing apps to store a user’s blood glucose level as part of their Google account. The Google Fit app will now likely let users enter this data manually.
It’s pertinent to mention here that unreleased features discovered in an APK teardown may or may not make it in a future release. But, in this case, it’s highly likely that Google Fit will gain both Paced Walking and Blood Glucose Tracking features soon. We will keep you updated as and when these features roll out publicly.