OnePlus, Realme join Xiaomi, OPPO, Vivo's Peer-to-Peer Transmission Alliance
Even as Google continues to work on an AirDrop-like file transfer system for Android, leading phone makers are moving ahead with their own plan of embracing a Peer-To-Peer Transmission standard. The work was started with Xiaomi, OPPO, and Vivo teaming up, and now, other popular OEMs are jumping on the same bandwagon. Here is more about it.
Companies joining cross-brand P2P transmission alliance
Announced in 2019, the transmission alliance strived to create a unified Bluetooth and Wi-Fi-based file transfer solution for phones from OPPO, Vivo, and Xiaomi. Now, following the three companies, OnePlus, Black Shark, Realme, and MEIZU have joined the group, confirming that their phones will also use the new technology. The announcement from the giants came through a coordinated series of posts on Weibo.
What makes the transfer standard unique?
The unified system, which started rolling out in February, will enable file transfers between the devices of all the aforementioned companies, without requiring any third-party app like SHAREit. It will support various file formats, starting from PDFs to entire folders, and reach as many as 400 million people in the coming months, serving as the companies' joint answer to the AirDrop system of Apple.
It will be pretty fast, as well
Once enabled on the phones of all the partner brands, the P2P protocol will handle the file transfer needs of users with speeds of up to 20Mbps and minimal power consumption. The whole process will work without using the internet, as the tech uses the involved phones' Bluetooth for pairing and Wi-Fi P2P (Peer-to-Peer) connection for sending/receiving the data.
Google is also working on a similar system
Along with the Chinese phone-makers, Google is also working on a native file-sharing solution, called Nearby Sharing, for Android. It will be baked into the OS, like AirDrop, but might not be available for smartphones being released in China, which is where the P2P Alliance comes in. Nearby Sharing could be launched with Android 11 later this year.
