Google announced at the I/O 2026 conference that Android 17 will launch a new feature called "Continue On", which will allow users to seamlessly continue current tasks between multiple Android devices. It is regarded as an important layout for the Android camp to benchmark Apple's Handoff experience. This feature was first disclosed in the "I/O 2026 - New Android Features" keynote speech, and then more technical details were disclosed on Google's description page for developers.
According to Google's official description, "Continue On" allows users to start an application on an Android device and complete some operations, and then smoothly transfer this "journey" to another device in the same ecosystem to continue. When multiple Android devices log in to the same account, activities from one device will appear as suggestions on the other device, and users can just tap to continue the previous operation without reopening or looking for content.
Google said that this capability is designed to support bidirectional transmission, but in the initial stage it will be mainly enabled between Android phones and tablets. In the official example, the Google document being edited on the mobile phone can appear as a "relay" suggestion in the Dock bar at the bottom of the tablet. After the user clicks on the tablet, he can directly open the same document and continue editing. Another example shows an email scenario: an email in Gmail can be transferred from the mobile phone to the Chrome browser on the tablet through "Continue On", and the corresponding email page can be opened directly.
From the perspective of concept and experience path, "Continue On" is quite similar to the Handoff function that Apple has provided between iPhone, iPad, and Mac since 2014. The core is under the same account, allowing users to continue the same task across devices without being interrupted by device switching. However, Google has not yet mentioned when this feature will be expanded to more device forms, such as Chromebooks or other smart terminals.
Google said that "Continue On" will be provided with the Android 17 "RC1" version. The "RC1" here is usually regarded as a release candidate version before the official version. The report pointed out that the last planned test version of Android 17 was pushed nearly a month ago. It would not be unprecedented if Google launched a separate "17.1" small version update for this feature. There had been update arrangements similar to "16 Beta 4.1" during the Android 16 testing phase.
At present, in addition to "Continue On", Android 17 is also continuing to make adjustments and optimizations in terms of system interface animation, blur effects, and new 3D emoticons, which overall releases a signal that Google is simultaneously making efforts in cross-device experience and visual style. As "Continue On" enters the RC version and is subsequently distributed to more terminals, the shortcomings of the Android ecosystem in multi-device collaborative experience are expected to be compensated to a certain extent, providing users with a more coherent usage path between mobile phones and tablets for daily office work and content consumption.