Edgar Cervantes / Android Authority
TL;DR
- Google Wallet seems to be preparing a new way to “favorite” passes.
- Users will be able to tap a star button to add a pass to their favorites and have it appear on the home screen.
- It’s unclear whether the starred or favorited passes will be highlighted somehow on the Wallet app’s home screen, or if they’ll show up directly on your phone’s home screen.
Google Wallet has steadily evolved from a simple payment tool into a hub for boarding passes, transit cards, event tickets, loyalty programs, and much more. As the number of stored passes grows, so does the need for better organization. Now, it looks like Google is preparing a new way to manage your passes to help you access them faster.
We dug through Google Play Services version 25.37.31 beta and discovered code strings referencing a new way to “favorite” passes. According to the string we found, the option will let you tap a star button to add a pass to your home screen. This suggests that Google is testing a new system for highlighting your most important passes. However, it’s not entirely clear whether that means the starred or favorited passes will show up within the Wallet app itself, or directly on your phone’s home screen.
Code
Copy TextTap the star to add this pass to your home screen
The code also includes a new database table that supports this functionality.
CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `WalletObjectEntity` (`objectType` TEXT NOT NULL, `objectId` TEXT NOT NULL, `isFavorited` INTEGER NOT NULL, `favoriteRank` INTEGER, `lastOpenTimeMillis` INTEGER, PRIMARY KEY(`objectType`, `objectId`))
This database is what the app uses behind the scenes to store details about your passes and tickets. In it, Google has added new columns for things like:
- Whether a pass is marked as a favorite
- The order of your favorites
- The last time you opened a pass
This suggests Google Wallet is getting ready to separate starred passes from regular ones. The app could probably highlight them in a certain way to make them appear different from regular passes, or Google could make these favorited passes appear as shortcuts on the phone’s home screen.
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Currently, Google Wallet allows you to sort passes by issuer, group them, or archive passes you don’t use. But the new “favorite” system could go a step further.
Right now, when you add passes to your Google Wallet, they already show up on the app’s home screen. So if this feature applies only to the Google Wallet home screen, starring a pass may simply pin it to the top for quick access. However, it would make much more sense for favorited passes to extend to the launcher’s home screen, allowing you to find a specific pass without even opening the Google Wallet. Imagine tapping your boarding pass or transit card from your home screen before taking a trip.
At this point, details of how Google Wallet will implement the feature remain ambiguous. We’ll have to wait for future updates to see if favorite passes help better organize the app internally or if a launcher shortcut is on the horizon.
⚠️ 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.
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