As announced via an official blog, Google will shut down the legacy version of its mobile apps including Drive, Docs, Sheets, and Slides as on April 3, 2017. The older versions of the mentioned services will be withdrawn from both Android and iOS platforms.
The tech giant will start sending out notifications for G Suite users to update their apps beginning 1st March 2017. The users will be forced to upgrade to the latest version of the app if he/she wants to continue to use the service. For a user to check the version of their app, it is usually available in the settings menu. The list of versions currently on deathbed include:
- Google Drive for Android (prior to version 2.4.311)
- Google Docs for Android (prior to version 1.6.292)
- Google Sheets for Android (prior to version 1.6.292)
- Google Slides for Android (prior to version 1.6.292)
- Google Drive for iOS (prior to version 4.16)
- Google Docs for iOS (prior to version 1.2016.12204)
- Google Sheets for iOS (prior to version 1.2016.12208)
- Google Slides for iOS (prior to version 1.2016.12203)
The said change will only impact the mobile version of apps and hence will not cause any alteration in the corresponding web and desktop applications. People avoid updating to the latest versions only due to two key reasons – one being hardware restraints in devices with lower-end specifications and the other one being storage capacity of mobiles. The updated version generally occupies much more space. Though the mentioned reasons will hardly affect the decision of users considering the services provided by Google’s mobile apps.
Google further added in its blog post,
Please note that after March 1, some users with very old versions will be forced to upgrade when they receive the prompt. If you are using any of these unsupported versions, we encourage you to download and install the latest version of that mobile application.
The step is in hand with Google’s plans to provide users with improved and enhanced apps. In a similar attempt, Google recently enabled offline search mode for internet deprived users. The tech behemoth is constantly upgrading its services to enhance the user experience.
