OpenAI has started rolling out a number of new features to ChatGPT, according to Techcrunch.
The big news is support for reminders; the feature allows users, for example, to ask ChatGPT to remind them when it’s time to renew an ID or passport. Users can also ask ChatGPT to deliver a news summary or weather forecast at the same time every day — something OpenAI called Tasks.
Initially, the new abilities will only be available to paying customers of Chat GPT Plus, Team, and Pro.
OpenAI has started rolling out a number of new features to ChatGPT, according to Techcrunch.
The big news is support for reminders; the feature allows users, for example, to ask ChatGPT to remind them when it’s time to renew an ID or passport. Users can also ask ChatGPT to deliver a news summary or weather forecast at the same time every day — something OpenAI called Tasks.
Initially, the new abilities will only be available to paying customers of Chat GPT Plus, Team, and Pro.
OpenAI has started rolling out a number of new features to ChatGPT, according to Techcrunch.
The big news is support for reminders; the feature allows users, for example, to ask ChatGPT to remind them when it’s time to renew an ID or passport. Users can also ask ChatGPT to deliver a news summary or weather forecast at the same time every day — something OpenAI called Tasks.
Initially, the new abilities will only be available to paying customers of Chat GPT Plus, Team, and Pro.
OpenAI has started rolling out a number of new features to ChatGPT, according to Techcrunch.
The big news is support for reminders; the feature allows users, for example, to ask ChatGPT to remind them when it’s time to renew an ID or passport. Users can also ask ChatGPT to deliver a news summary or weather forecast at the same time every day — something OpenAI called Tasks.
Initially, the new abilities will only be available to paying customers of Chat GPT Plus, Team, and Pro.
When considering new hires, 80% of corporate executives will prioritize skills over degrees, with half planning to increase freelance hiring this year to fill in for a gap in AI and other skills, according to a new study from freelancing platform Upwork.
The study, released this week, showed “unprecedented growth” in specialized AI skills, which have surged 220% year-over-year.
At the same time, degrees continue to lose relevance when it comes to hiring freelancers, with 74% of execs focused more on proven expertise. Moreover, 78% of CEOs say top freelancers deliver more value than degree-holding employees, emphasizing skills over credentials to stay competitive. And 29% of C-suite executives consider freelancers essential to their operations, with 51% saying their business would be difficult to run without freelancer support.
Skills-based hiring has been on the rise for several years, as organizations seek to fill specific tech needs such as big data analytics, programing (such as Rust) and AI prompt engineering. In fact, demand for genAI courses is surging, passing all other tech skills courses and spanning fields from data science to cybersecurity, project management, and marketing.
The top 10 highest paid skills in tech can help workers earn up to 47% more — and the top skill among them is generative artificial intelligence (genAI), according to employment website Indeed and other sources.
Skills such as genAI modeling now earn freelancers up to 22% higher hourly rates than traditional AI and machine learning roles, according to Upwork.
Even as freelancers are reshaping workforce strategies, their rise doesn’t necessarily threaten full-time roles. “It complements them,” said Kelly Monahan, managing director of the Upwork Research Institute.
In a study released in October, Upwork found that 85% of top-performing companies — which it labels “work innovators” — view freelancers as vital, with 91% planning to expand their use over the next year. Only 71% of non top-performing companies see freelancers as critical to success, Monahan said.
While cost savings, such as not paying benefits, could sometimes be a factor in hiring freelancers, it is not the primary driver of freelance hiring, according to Monahan.“Businesses prioritize freelancers for their agility and specialized expertise, which enable them to scale resources up or down as needed and address skill gaps effectively,” she said.
According to Upwork, other reasons for the increase in freelance hiring include:
In addition to hard skills, soft, human-centric roles such as personal coaching have emerged among the fastest-growing skills on Upwork’s platform, with demand increasing by 74% year-over-year. “This underscores the growing importance of guidance and adaptability as businesses invest in reskilling their workforces to navigate technological change,” Monahan said. “Freelancers are enabling companies to innovate rapidly and adapt to changing market demands.”
Upwork is not alone in its findings. According to research firm Gartner, organizations are struggling to find skilled talent, and universities — once vital for workforce preparation — are lagging in updating curricula to match modern demands. As technology and work methods advance, graduates are left with outdated skills, making specific competencies more important than degrees in proving a candidate’s value.
According to Gartner, 74% of HR leaders believe organizations are shifting to skills-based talent management, but only 41% have implemented it, while 50% are still considering it.
“Approximately half of HR leaders say that a skills-based approach to talent management has the potential to solve many of the challenges their organizations face, though only one-third are actually investing in a skills-based approach to talent management, Gartner said in its report.
HR leaders, Gartner said, should prepare for a skills-focused future by:
Companies are adopting more advanced approaches to assessing potential and current employee skills, blending AI tools with hands-on evaluations, according to Monahan.
AI-powered platforms are being used to match candidates with roles based on their skills, certifications, and experience. “Our platform has done this for years, and our new UMA (Upwork’s Mindful AI) enhances this process,” she said.
Gartner, however, warned that “rapid skills evolutions can threaten quality of hire, as recruiters struggle to ensure their assessment processes are keeping pace with changing skills. Meanwhile, skills shortages place more weight on new hires being the right hires, as finding replacement talent becomes increasingly challenging. Robust appraisal of candidate skills is therefore imperative, but too many assessments can lead to candidate fatigue.”
In Upwork’s In-Demand Skills 2025 report, the skills that are growing in importance include:
The shift toward skills-based hiring is further driven by a readiness gap in today’s workforce. Upwork’s research found that only 25% of employees feel prepared to work effectively alongside AI, and even fewer (19%) can proactively leverage AI to solve problems.
“As companies navigate these challenges, they’re focusing on hiring based on practical, demonstrated capabilities, ensuring their workforce is agile and equipped to meet the demands of a rapidly evolving business landscape,” Monahan said.
According to Upwork, 47% of Gen Z professionals already engage in freelance or portfolio work, reflecting their preference for autonomy and skills diversification over traditional career paths.
“This aligns with modern businesses’ needs for agile talent who can deliver measurable results, driving the shift toward skills-based hiring,” Monahan said. “If you are just looking to fill job roles, you will miss out on the rising portfolio career talent.”
Apple has big plans for satellite services, a new patent filing confirms. It’s the latest nugget of information to roll down Apple Confidential mountain, a plan to make it much easier for devices to maintain connectivity as they move between satellites.
If you’ve been able to use any of the company’s satellite services, you’ll already know that it takes a while to reach a connection with your nearest satellite. Apple has built a handy little visual guide to help you point your device at the best available satellite, but connection takes time —and as the satellite drifts over head on its orbit, you might eventually find you must reconnect to another station.
Wouldn’t it be better if your connection could automatically move between satellites once it is achieved? That kind of capability might support a more stable connection, and (conceivably) let you get more sophisticated tasks done — perhaps even calls or at least extensive two-way messaging.
What’s new is that Apple now appears to have achieved a way that could enable that.
As first spotted by Patently Apple, the new patent describes a handover procedure that means the connection a device has with one satellite will smoothly shift over to a second. The technology means that a satellite will generate a group configuration message for all the devices currently connected to it that, when sent, tells the connected devices to transfer their connection to the second satellite.
The idea is that each satellite then acts as a “transparent network relay mode,” according to the patent. That, the patent claims, would enable groups of smartphones to remain connected. Effectively, this turns those satellites into always moving mobile network masks above the sky.
Just as mobile networks will serve all the smartphones connected to them in a local area, the satellites will do the same thing. I imagine the aim is to create a seamless satellite connection users don’t have to think too deeply about, once the initial connection is made.
This kind of stable connection is of course essential to support voice calls and internet browsing, though Apple might not be thinking about a future satellite communications service in quite the same way. It could, for example, be simply searching for a global backbone to support its Find My services, or to deliver smart device connectivity off more traditional grids, or even be pondering a highly secure, network agnostic private and secure communications system as a premium service.
Apple isn’t alone.
Carriers, including AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile, are also now working with satellite services to provide messaging and other features to devices, and Apple will not be investing billions in its satellite partner, GlobalStar, simply to be a bystander in this race.
It is also interesting, given the quantity of data shared with mobile networks, that Apple’s filing makes particular mention of this: “It is well understood that the use of personally identifiable information should follow privacy policies and practices that are generally recognized as meeting or exceeding industry or governmental requirements for maintaining the privacy of users. In particular, personally identifiable information data should be managed and handled so as to minimize risks of unintentional or unauthorized access or use, and the nature of authorized use should be clearly indicated to users,.”
You can take a look at the new patent here.
All this investment isn’t just focused on voice and messaging. Operators also recognize that as demand for mobile connectivity increases, it becomes essential to find ways to offload some of this activity to alternative networks. That’s why carriers support Wi-Fi calls — because shunting relatively unprofitable voice calls off their network enables them to offer their capacity to support more profitable services.
Ultimately, it’s all about demand management, and satellite (particularly as 5G tech advances and 6G looms) has a part to play in the tapestry of solutions emerging to help handle the rapidly growing pressure on communications networks. Though there is something to be said for highly private communications and messaging services. Fifty-five years since the first human landing on the moon, if Neil Armstrong landed there today, perhaps he’d call Earth from his iPhone.
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Google will no longer charge Workspace customers an additional fee for Gemini, expanding access to generative AI (genAI) features in apps such as Gmail, Docs, and Sheets. At the same time, the company is increasing the price of Workspace subscriptions by a small amount.
“Google is disrupting a market while some application vendors are still trying to monetize generative AI,” said Wayne Kurtzman, research vice president for collaboration and communities at IDC. It’s an “unusually bold first move” by Google, one that “should result in paid user growth of their Workspace platform.
“We are moving to an economy where we will experience AI everywhere, so it makes sense that we see AI included in office and collaboration applications,” said Kurtzman.
Google launched its Gemini AI assistant (formerly Duet AI for Google Workspace) in August 2023. There were two main add-ons: Gemini Business priced at $20 per user per month, and Gemini Enterprise, which cost $30 per user per month. Each represented a significant outlay for Workspace customers on top of their core subscriptions; Google later introduced more affordable add-on options that provided a limited set of genAI tools: AI Meetings and Messages and AI Security, both costing $10 per user a month.
All of those subscription costs will end as of March 17, Google said in a blog post Wednesday.
Instead, Gemini features will be included in regular paid Workspace plans from the Business Standard plan upwards. That will allow access to Gemini in the side panel of several Workspace apps, as well as automated note taking in Meet video calls, image generation in Docs and Slides, and access to the NotebookLM Plus app.
(Google has a detailed list of the AI features available and coming soon to each payment plan at its admin help site here.)
At the same time, the price of payment plans will increase. Business Standard will rise from $12 to $14 per user each month when paid on an annual basis; Business Plus customers will see a more substantial increase — from $18 to $22 per user a month. The Business Starter plan, which will provide access to limited Gemini capabilities, will go from $6 to $7 per user a month.
Google doesn’t provide details on the Workspace Enterprise tier publically.
The change to pricing will begin today, Google said.
The move could be seen as the commodification of genAI; more than two years after ChatGPT 3.5 launched, AI assistant tools have become common and vendors have shifted their attention to more advanced AI agents. Or Google may have moved on from its attempt to convince customers to pay a premium for Gemini over and above the base subscription costs.
“While there’s an element of truth to both, Google’s sales channel and customers may well celebrate,” J.P. Gownder, vice president and principal analyst on Forrester’s Future of Work team, said in a blog post about the announcement.
One implication of the decision is to make genAI tools available to all employees with access to Workspace; due to the high per-user cost, many customers might have been selective about handing out licenses, dividing knowledge workers into AI “haves” and “have-nots.”
“This pricing change effectively removes a company’s need to determine who will get an AI productivity boost, and who will not,” said Kurtzman. “This should expand the number of paid seats of Google Workspace, as the value prop of usability and AI are clear.”
It could also convince more companies to switch to the paid version of Workspace.
“Many companies still use the free version of Google Workspace to access collaborative features that their current applications do not support,” said Kurtzman. “The inclusion of AI and a price point much lower than many competitors should result in additional paid users to Google Workspace.”
Google’s move will clearly put pressure on Microsoft — which charges $30 per user a month for its M365 Copilot add-on — to follow suit, as well as other productivity software vendors that charge an extra fee for access to genAI capabilities. (Zoom is a notable exception, having included its AI Companion in its apps at no extra cost since launch.)
As the cost of running large language models (LLMs) drops, this is a natural direction of travel: Gartneranalysts have said they expect genAI features to be included at no extra cost in office software subscriptions by 2028, according to a recent report (subscription required), as vendors seek broader adoption of their tools.
Price cuts will likely spur wider adoption. Microsoft has found it difficult to convince large numbers of customers to adopt its M365 Copilot widely across their organizations, with subscription costs one of the barriers. Microsoft has already bundled Copilot into consumer M365 subscriptions in some countries and willlikely do the same for business customers eventually.
“How long can Microsoft hold the line — and for how long — on $30/user/month? We’re betting the pricing strategy evolves,” said Gownder.
Google will no longer charge Workspace customers an additional fee for Gemini, expanding access to generative AI (genAI) features in apps such as Gmail, Docs, and Sheets. At the same time, the company is increasing the price of Workspace subscriptions by a small amount.
“Google is disrupting a market while some application vendors are still trying to monetize generative AI,” said Wayne Kurtzman, research vice president for collaboration and communities at IDC. It’s an “unusually bold first move” by Google, one that “should result in paid user growth of their Workspace platform.
“We are moving to an economy where we will experience AI everywhere, so it makes sense that we see AI included in office and collaboration applications,” said Kurtzman.
Google launched its Gemini AI assistant (formerly Duet AI for Google Workspace) in August 2023. There were two main add-ons: Gemini Business priced at $20 per user per month, and Gemini Enterprise, which cost $30 per user per month. Each represented a significant outlay for Workspace customers on top of their core subscriptions; Google later introduced more affordable add-on options that provided a limited set of genAI tools: AI Meetings and Messages and AI Security, both costing $10 per user a month.
All of those subscription costs will end as of March 17, Google said in a blog post Wednesday.
Instead, Gemini features will be included in regular paid Workspace plans from the Business Standard plan upwards. That will allow access to Gemini in the side panel of several Workspace apps, as well as automated note taking in Meet video calls, image generation in Docs and Slides, and access to the NotebookLM Plus app.
(Google has a detailed list of the AI features available and coming soon to each payment plan at its admin help site here.)
At the same time, the price of payment plans will increase. Business Standard will rise from $12 to $14 per user each month when paid on an annual basis; Business Plus customers will see a more substantial increase — from $18 to $22 per user a month. The Business Starter plan, which will provide access to limited Gemini capabilities, will go from $6 to $7 per user a month.
Google doesn’t provide details on the Workspace Enterprise tier publically.
The change to pricing will begin today, Google said.
The move could be seen as the commodification of genAI; more than two years after ChatGPT 3.5 launched, AI assistant tools have become common and vendors have shifted their attention to more advanced AI agents. Or Google may have moved on from its attempt to convince customers to pay a premium for Gemini over and above the base subscription costs.
“While there’s an element of truth to both, Google’s sales channel and customers may well celebrate,” J.P. Gownder, vice president and principal analyst on Forrester’s Future of Work team, said in a blog post about the announcement.
One implication of the decision is to make genAI tools available to all employees with access to Workspace; due to the high per-user cost, many customers might have been selective about handing out licenses, dividing knowledge workers into AI “haves” and “have-nots.”
“This pricing change effectively removes a company’s need to determine who will get an AI productivity boost, and who will not,” said Kurtzman. “This should expand the number of paid seats of Google Workspace, as the value prop of usability and AI are clear.”
It could also convince more companies to switch to the paid version of Workspace.
“Many companies still use the free version of Google Workspace to access collaborative features that their current applications do not support,” said Kurtzman. “The inclusion of AI and a price point much lower than many competitors should result in additional paid users to Google Workspace.”
Google’s move will clearly put pressure on Microsoft — which charges $30 per user a month for its M365 Copilot add-on — to follow suit, as well as other productivity software vendors that charge an extra fee for access to genAI capabilities. (Zoom is a notable exception, having included its AI Companion in its apps at no extra cost since launch.)
As the cost of running large language models (LLMs) drops, this is a natural direction of travel: Gartneranalysts have said they expect genAI features to be included at no extra cost in office software subscriptions by 2028, according to a recent report (subscription required), as vendors seek broader adoption of their tools.
Price cuts will likely spur wider adoption. Microsoft has found it difficult to convince large numbers of customers to adopt its M365 Copilot widely across their organizations, with subscription costs one of the barriers. Microsoft has already bundled Copilot into consumer M365 subscriptions in some countries and willlikely do the same for business customers eventually.
“How long can Microsoft hold the line — and for how long — on $30/user/month? We’re betting the pricing strategy evolves,” said Gownder.
When you think about your smartphone, apps and interfaces are probably the first things that come to mind. Beneath all that surface-level stuff, though, our modern mobile devices are filled with files — folders upon folders of ’em! — just like the clunky ol’ computers we’ve relied upon for ages.
We may not come face to face with our phones’ file systems too often, but it’s valuable to know they’re there — and to know how they can work for us when the need arises. Whether you’re looking to dig up downloaded PDFs and presentations, open up ZIP files that a client emailed you, or move files from your phone to a computer, tablet, or even another Android phone or an iPhone, you’ve got all sorts of options to get down to business.
Here’s everything you need to know to tap into your phone’s file managing and transferring powers.
You might not realize it at a glance, but Android actually allows you to access a device’s entire file system — even from the device itself.
The key is finding the right file manager to handle the job. That type of app makes it incredibly easy to browse, search, and interact with all the files stored locally on your device as well as clean up your local storage to free up space. You can even compress or uncompress files and add extra encryption onto especially sensitive items.
You’ll likely need just a single standout Android file manager to handle all of that and then some. I’ve narrowed down the field to two top contenders — one that’s the best all-around option for most professionals and one that offers an extra-advanced and robust file management experience with all sorts of interesting extras.
Check out my Android file manager recommendations and see which path makes the most sense for you, then keep whichever app you end up with handy for on-demand file-wrangling right from your device.
One little-known feature of Android is its ability to connect with external storage devices like USB memory sticks and even larger-capacity portable hard drives. A phone just has to support something known as USB On-The-Go, or USB OTG, in order for the connection to work.
A fair number of devices, including Google’s Pixel phones and many Samsung Galaxy products, offer such support. If you aren’t sure if your phone does, your best bet is to Google its name along with “USB OTG”; odds are, you’ll find the answer fairly quickly.
Provided your device supports USB OTG, all you need is a USB-A to USB-C adapter like this one made by Amazon. Use the adapter to plug the external drive into your phone, then look for a notification confirming the drive is connected.
Tap the “Explore” option within the notification, and that’s it: You can now browse and access all the files on your external drive.
Look for the notification that pops up when an external drive is connected, and you’ll be browsing the drive’s contents in no time.
JR Raphael / IDG
When you’re finished, don’t forget to go back to the notification and tap “Eject” before disconnecting the drive.
In addition to supporting external hard drives, your Android device can act as an external hard drive for fast file transfers with any computer. And with a Windows system, it’s especially easy to make that connection.
Just plug your Android device into any open USB port on your Windows computer, then turn on the phone’s screen and unlock it.
Swipe your finger down from the top of the screen, and you should see a notification about the current USB connection. At this point, it’ll probably tell you your phone is connected only for charging.
After you connect your phone to your computer, a notification will let you prepare it for transferring files.
JR Raphael / IDG
Tap the notification and select “Transfer files” or “File transfer” in the menu that appears. If media files are all you’re planning to move, you could also use the “Transfer photos” (sometimes listed as “PTP”) option, which’ll treat your phone like a digital camera.
Once you’ve made your selection, go to your desktop and open up a File Explorer window — using whatever method lines up with your Windows workflow:
Then look for an icon representing your phone alongside other portable devices and drives. Click or double-click that icon, and ta-da: You’ll be staring at your Android phone’s internal storage. You can now click around and browse folders, drag and drop files between your phone and PC, or manipulate the data in any way you want — as if it were any other ordinary drive.
Got a Mac? The Android file transfer process is a bit more complicated for you — but fear not, for it’s still reasonably easy to get going.
The main difference is that before things will work, you’ll need to download and install a program that’ll allow your Mac to interact with your Android device. Google used to have its own program for this purpose called Android File Transfer, but the company seems to have quietly phased that app out over time (which isn’t entirely surprising, as Mac owners had been complaining about its reliability for years).
What you’ll want instead is the favorably reviewed third-party Commander One. It costs $30 for a single license or $100 for a five-user team license. Once installed and configured, it’ll let you browse your Android device’s storage, transfer files in either direction, and even interact with data on the phone or tablet without transferring anything.
Or — well, skip down to the final section of this story for one other option.
You’d expect file transfers between Android phones and Chromebooks to be as simple as can be, considering that Google’s the driving force behind both of those platforms — and by golly, you’d be absolutely right.
Just like with Windows, all you’ve gotta do to connect your Android phone to a ChromeOS device is plug it into any open USB port on the computer, then tap the USB charging notification on the phone and select the appropriate option for file transferring.
Once you do that, a prompt to open the ChromeOS Files app should automatically appear on your Chromebook, with your phone loaded as the active storage focus. You can then simply drag and drop files in either direction as needed.
Pulling up your Android phone’s storage on a Chromebook is as easy as can be.
JR Raphael / IDG
Told ya it was easy! And you’ve got one more option yet.
Good ol’ wired transfers are fast and reliable, sure — but these days, you can also opt to move files from your Android device to another Android device, a computer, or even (gasp!) an iPhone without needing any physical connection.
You’ve got a few possible paths worth considering here:
Google’s own native-to-Android wireless sharing solution makes it effortless to beam files between any Android device and another Android device, a Chromebook, or a Windows computer. Just use the standard system share command within any app on Android, then select Quick Share from the list of options that pops up and follow the steps that show up to get started.
If the other device is running Android or ChromeOS, search its system settings for quick share to make sure it’s set up and ready to receive. If the other device is a Windows computer, download the official Google Quick Share Windows app to connect it.
And if the other device is running any other operating system, consider one of the next two wireless file-sharing strategies instead.
PairDrop is a free and open-source service that lets you wirelessly send files between any devices on the same network, no matter what operating system they’re running.
It works entirely on the web: All you’ve gotta do is open up the PairDrop website on both devices, then click the center area of the screen or drag and drop files to initiate a transfer.
PairDrop brings wireless file transferring to any devices across any platforms — Android, iOS, Mac, you name it.
JR Raphael / IDG
That’s it: No downloads, no sign-ups, no hassles whatsoever. And the service’s open-source code makes it clear that no data is ever stored or even touched by a remote server as part of the process.
If PairDrop isn’t for you and Quick Share isn’t doing the trick, the time-tested tactic of embracing a middleman can get the job done.
Simply pick any cloud storage you like — Google Drive, Dropbox, Microsoft OneDrive, or any other such service. Upload the files you want to transfer into a folder within the respective app on your Android phone, then find the folder within the same app on the receiving device (or vice-versa). Or, if the sharing involves other people, share the folder with them within the same cloud storage service app.
Maybe you like having certain files stored locally on your Android phone, but you also want those files to be backed up and saved on your computer. The best of both worlds, right?
Believe it or not, this is actually quite easy to pull off. Just grab an Android app called AutoSync, which is available for use with Google Drive, OneDrive, Dropbox, and Box. It’ll let you create pairings between a local folder on your phone and a cloud-based folder — for free with a single folder pair and files smaller than 10MB or for a one-time $5 payment without any real restrictions.
Install the appropriate computer-side app for whichever service you prefer, make sure it’s set to sync with your computer’s hard drive — and there ya have it: Your Android device’s folder is now effectively part of your PC.
You can even have the folders stay constantly synced in both directions — so if you add or update a file on the computer, the same changes will appear on your phone as well.
Congratulations: You’ve officially earned the title of Android file master. (For real — you can even type it into a document, print it out, and tape it to your desk so everyone knows.)
Next up: Make sure you understand the ins and outs of Android backups. They’re ultimately made up of files, too, after all — and pretty important ones, at that.
This article was originally published in August 2017 and most recently updated in January 2025.
File management may not be the most exciting subject surrounding smartphone ownership — but if you use your device for productivity, my goodness, is it ever worth your while to chew over.
Your phone, after all, is your on-the-go connection to the world. It’s the always-available PC of our modern computing era. And whether your work involves presentations, PDFs, documents, or images, you’re bound to find yourself fumbling around with files on your pocket-sized screen sooner or later.
With the right tool for the job, though, managing files on your phone doesn’t have to be a hassle. Android’s got some outstanding file manager options, and best of all? You almost certainly only need one of ’em — a single standout file manager to handle all of your file-wrangling requirements.
Read on and see which path makes the most sense for you.
First and foremost, if your Android file needs are fairly simple and straightforward, Files by Google — or Google Files, for short — is the Android file manager you want.
Google Files has come a long way since its inconspicuous 2017 debut. These days, Files is a fully featured file management tool, with all the basics you’d expect and some compelling extras — all packed into a nicely designed and easy-to-use interface that’s compatible with any Android device (even if it typically comes preinstalled only on Pixels).
At its core, Google Files makes it painless and almost even pleasant to browse through your phone’s local storage and find, share, or organize any files you’ve downloaded or transferred onto the device. The app lets you look through folders or sort items by type (documents, images, videos, and so on) and optionally move sensitive materials into an encrypted and password-protected Safe Folder.
It has a spectacular search system, too, including the ability to search for text that appears within PDFs, images, and documents on your device. It even offers a convenient way to send any locally stored files directly to Google Drive with a couple quick taps — though it doesn’t, curiously enough, actually let you browse and interact with your Drive storage or connect at all to any non-Google cloud services. If that sort of more robust all-in-one control center for handling both local and remote storage is what you’re after, the Android file manager in the next section will be more suitable for you.
Files by Google lets you browse your phone’s local storage and perform a variety of actions on folders and files.
JR Raphael / IDG
Google Files can open and now also create compressed archives, too, and it even has a handy built-in option for scanning physical documents on demand and saving ’em as neatly cropped PDF files.
Perhaps most helpful of all is Files’ integrated system for freeing up storage on your phone: Just tap the app’s three-line menu icon, in the upper-right corner, and select “Clean” to see an ever-evolving set of intelligent suggestions for superfluous files you can safely delete. Files will also show you which apps you haven’t opened in a while and make it especially easy to uninstall ’em right then and there.
All in all, Google Files is a well-rounded and intuitive file manager that handles all the file management tasks most business users will need on a phone. It’s a significant upgrade from the default file managers that come preinstalled on most non-Pixel Android devices, and if you don’t have any special requirements or advanced demands, it’s almost certainly the app for you.
Google Files is free.
For anyone who needs a little more mobile file management oomph, Solid Explorer is the way to go.
Solid Explorer has all the same file manipulation basics as Google’s Files app but adds in advanced options like the ability to encrypt files and even create password-protected ZIP collections. It’s also able to integrate with a wide variety of internet-based storage services — including Google Drive, along with Dropbox, Microsoft OneDrive, and your own private servers — and then serve as a streamlined interface for managing all of your stuff and transferring data between different locations.
Solid Explorer is overflowing with advanced options for manipulating files and working with cloud storage.
JR Raphael / IDG
Solid Explorer has a clever two-panel interface for fuss-free dragging and dropping between locations, too — be they two local folders or a combination of local and cloud-based folders from any connected service. All you have to do is flip your phone sideways or open the app on a wide-screen tablet or foldable device for that setup to appear.
Solid Explorer’s smart two-panel interface allows you to view two folders together and drag and drop files between them.
JR Raphael / IDG
From variable-based batch renaming to folder bookmarking and even support for casting content to a TV or other Google-Cast-compatible display, Solid Explorer is just jam-packed with useful stuff — and yet it manages to remain reasonably simple and easy to use. (It also works exceptionally well on a Chromebook, and once you’ve bought it for your phone, you can install it onto any ChromeOS device without having to pay again.) The app’s advanced elements won’t be necessary for most people, but if your on-the-go work requires such next-level file management functions, Solid Explorer is the path to pursue.
Solid Explorer costs $3 after a free 14-day trial.
Important as they are, of course, Android file managers themselves are just one piece of the puzzle.
Google’s mobile operating system has some powerful native systems for beaming files between different devices, transferring files from your phone to a computer, and supplementing your phone’s local storage. With a few minutes of simple setup, you can even create special folders on your phone that automatically sync with matching folders in your favorite cloud storage service — and vice-versa.
Head over to my Android file management guide next to explore all the ins and outs of managing files on Android — including the easiest ways to wirelessly transfer files on the fly.
It may not be exciting, exactly, but you’d better believe it’ll make a world of difference.
This article was originally published in April 2018 and most recently updated in January 2025.
