Many Android users may have seen an error related to Google Play Services at least once. Some are puzzled by the existence of the app and its purpose. Read below to learn all you need to know about it and how to fix a possible issue.
What is Google Play Services?
Google Play Services is an app that appears when you are looking at the list of apps installed on your devices. However, it is a passive core app, and there is no way to launch it. The app is present by default across all Android devices, and Google will push new updates regularly.
The app also requires an extended list of permissions because it interacts with many tasks, among which we can mention SMS activity log data, information related to other apps, and much more. To simplify the concept, you can envision Google Play Services as a series of links that facilitate communication between different apps and ensures that many third-party apps can run without problems.
Purpose of the app
One of the best features of the app is that it allows Google to update core apps regularly. In the past, the Google Maps app was updated only when a new major Android version was released, but this is no longer the case as updates are downloaded and installed automatically with the help of Google Play Services.
This means that your device can gain access to the latest versions of apps without the need to update the firmware. However, the feature to most of the apps that are offered by Google and third-party apps will not run on a device with Android 5 Lollipop if the minimum requirement is Android 9 Pie.
Should you disable it?
Even if you want, there is no straight way to do it. It consumes a lot of battery and data. If that happens, you can go to Settings/Apps/ All/ Google Play Services and tap on the Uninstall updates option. Those are issues caused by bugs and glitches.
As for the latest update, that is Google Play services 19.6.68, and it comes with improvements and bug fixes.
