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Google could soon let you resume canceled Play Store downloads (APK teardown)
- Google is working on the ability to resume previously canceled app and game downloads from the Play Store.
- This would seemingly let you resume a Play Store app download up to 24 hours after canceling it.
- This feature could be handy if you started an app download in an area with poor connectivity or while on a limited mobile data plan.
Update: November 15, 2024 (7:25 AM ET): We recently uncovered evidence that Google is working on a new feature called Smart Resume, allowing you to resume previously canceled app or game downloads. Now, we’ve managed to activate the feature to get a better idea of how it works. Check out the video below.
Your Play Store storage can balloon if you’ve got many canceled app downloads (as seen below). Fortunately, this data should be cleared in 24 hours.
Original article: November 11, 2024 (1:12 AM ET): Google recently introduced the ability for up to three apps to be simultaneously downloaded from the Google Play Store. We’re glad to see this functionality, but it now looks like another download-related feature is coming to the app market.
An APK teardown helps predict features that may arrive on a service in the future based on work-in-progress code. However, it is possible that such predicted features may not make it to a public release.
We combed through the Google Play Store (version 43.5.26-31) and discovered that Google is working on a new feature called Smart Resume. This would apparently allow users to resume app or game downloads that were previously canceled. One of these code snippets suggests that you’ll be able to resume app/game downloads that were previously canceled via a notification.
SmartResume__enable_smart_resume
SmartResume__enable_smart_resume_for_cancel_through_notification
SmartResume__disable_temp_copy_removal
SmartResume__cached_download_min_size_percent - 0.1
SmartResume__cached_download_total_size_limit - 2000000000
SmartResume__min_free_space_for_smart_resume - 5000000000It’s worth noting that the Play Store keeps your downloaded app files in a temporary directory before installing them. These temporary files are deleted after the app is installed or after an app download is canceled. However, the third snippet above suggests that Smart Resume works by holding on to these temporary files. It’s believed the files will be held for up to 24 hours after canceling an app download. It also looks like this feature works with apps up to ~2GB in size while you’ll need at least ~5GB of free storage.
In any event, this could be a handy addition if you’ve canceled an app download due to mobile data usage concerns or if you’re in an area with poor internet connectivity (e.g. a rural area or on an airplane). This way, you can effectively pause your download until you get to a place with a better internet connection.