Android Instant Apps: the best new feature in any platform

Google has just revealed Android Instant Apps at their annual Google I/O developer conference.

This struck me as something extraordinary wicked. No kidding.

In the past:

1. Your friend sends you a link to a website / you read about something interesting and head to a website
2. The website has a dedicated app… which is compulsory to install in order to view the content
3. You freak out, you get angry, you shake your head
4. If the content was interesting enough, you might install the required app
5. After a minute or so, you get to the content inside the app
6. … just to realize you probably lost the original link and you have to get to it again from search, messaging etc.
7. Afterwards, you have to get rid off the app
8. During the uninstallation process you realize you might have given the app a vast amount of personal information by the required permissions you had to agree to in order to get to the goddamn content you wanted to see in the first place

That, above, is horrible. Rubbish. The flow is pathetic.

Enter Android Instant Apps…

1. You get a link from somewhere
2. You click it
3. Android automatically opens the dedicated app but *only* downloads the needed pieces of software in order to display you the content you were after
   1. You can use the app more, you can go to other sections etc.
   2. Android seamlessly downloads the needed pieces on the go
   3. No installation, no uninstallation, no nothing, just pure… something
4. When you’re ready, just exit

From my personal experience I really do vouch for this sort of features. The barrier to get into the actual content lowers so much when you are not required to waste your time, bandwidth and nerves downloading and installing useless one-shot applications that this should convert to vastly superior user experience (and more revenue, I suppose).

Ahh how I love Android.  Ps. This goes back to Android 4.2.

Ars Technica coverage, Android dev docs