Google has published the release notes for Google Play services v26.29 and Google Play Store v52.5, both dated 27 July 2026, and the most useful change in this wave lands on the wrist: Pixel Watch owners can now set up Express Pay directly on the watch instead of having to start the process on a paired phone.
Pixel Watch Express Pay setup moves to the watch
Express Pay is the setting that lets a smartwatch complete a contactless transaction without you unlocking or opening the wallet app first — you hold the watch to the terminal and it pays. Google’s note frames the change as being able to do that setup on the watch itself. Google’s own changelog entry for Play services v26.29 reads: “[Wear] Users can set up express pay for their Pixel Watch directly from their watch. Feature onboarding will also be smoother for new watch users.”
Worth being clear-eyed about what Express Pay actually is: it trades a security step for a convenience one. A watch with Express Pay enabled will pay when tapped, which is exactly the point at a transit gate and exactly the risk if the watch is off your wrist. The individual payment needs no unlock; the watch does still have to be unlocked in the session sense, so the exposure window is a watch left unlocked and off the wrist rather than a locked one that has been taken. Making the setup flow easier is good; it also means more people will switch it on without thinking about that trade-off.
“Connected apps” is now “Linked apps” everywhere
A smaller but broader change: Google has renamed the menu item that shows which third-party services have been granted access to your Google account data. Per the v26.29 notes, the change applies across “[Auto, PC, Phone, TV, Wear]” — so phones, tablets, Android TV, Android Auto and Wear OS all get the new wording. Nothing about the underlying permissions changes; only the label does. If you have ever gone hunting for “Connected apps” to revoke an app’s access, that is the screen, under a new name.
Also in v26.29, Google notes that Pix users can now use Gboard within communication applications — a Brazil-specific payments integration — plus the usual round of developer-facing plumbing for Maps, Wallet and system diagnostics, and bug fixes for System Management and Diagnostics services on phones.
Play Store v52.5: comics in Play Shorts, steadier Sidekick
The Play Store side of the same drop is short. Google lists three changes for v52.5:
- Play Shorts gets comics — popular comic books now appear in the Play Shorts feed, where you can swipe through previews and jump into the full story. This is the storefront’s short-form discovery feed, and Google is steadily filling it with content that is not games.
- Play Games Sidekick Dashboard — improved stability and a better experience, in Google’s wording. No detail on what was broken.
- Resumable travel searches — updates to Engage SDK content clusters let you pick a travel search back up from integrated third-party travel apps.
How this reaches your phone, and when
Google system services updates do not arrive as a normal OTA. Play services and the Play Store update themselves silently in the background, independently of your phone’s Android version or your manufacturer’s update schedule, which is why a five-year-old handset gets these on roughly the same timetable as a Pixel 10. The catch is that the rollout is staged. Google’s release-notes page carries one blanket caveat — “Some features may be experimental and available to certain users” — and neither the v26.29 nor the v52.5 entry gives a country list, a device list or a completion date.
To check where you stand, open Settings > Apps > See all apps > Google Play services > App details, which shows the version string. The Settings > About phone > Android version > Google Play system update screen gives you a date rather than a version number, which is useful for checking how current you are but will not tell you v26.28 from v26.29. If it still says v26.28, you are one wave behind — that is the release that added the IMEI-on-lock-screen option we covered last week. The Play Store build from that same 20 July wave, v52.4, is the one that brought natural language search queries and the option to add an app’s widget to your home screen during installation.
