Google Releases ‘WifiNanScan’ App

For the past several Android releases, tech-giant Google has been working on local discovery technologies that apps can use to find nearby objects and users. Meanwhile, according to the latest news, Google has launched a new WifiNanScan app for developers on the Google Play store.

This app measures distance among two smartphones using the WiFi Aware protocol. WiFi Aware is also called Neighbor Awareness Networking (NAN). This protocol enables all devices running Android 8.0 and above to discover and connect directly to each other. The WifiNanScan app is great for developers, vendors, universities, etc. It allows you to use NAN to know the distance between two devices.

The tech giant has released the new WifiNanScan app on the Google Play store that helps two devices in proximity to connect without the need for an Internet connection.

This app allow you to obtain a distance measurement with a precision of nearly one meter with phones up to 15 meters apart. Furthermore, developers, OEMs, and researchers can utilize this tool to validate distance/range measurements, allowing the development of peer-to-peer ranging and data transfer, find my phone, and context-aware applications based on the WiFi Aware/ NAN API.

The new WifiNanScan app is a free download

Significantly, Wi-Fi Aware network connections hold higher throughput rates across longer distances than Bluetooth connections. These connections are helpful for apps that share large amounts of data between users, for example, photo-sharing apps. Developers can utilize this technology in their apps to find nearby devices and users. The new WifiNanScan app is a free download on the Google Play store.

Earlier this week, Google released the WifiNanScan App to demonstrate how you can use NAN to get the distance between two devices.

It complements the WifiRttScan App launched two years ago to use Wi-Fi Round Trip Time for indoor positioning as an alternative to GPS.

In Android 12, the giant Google made some improvements to Wi-Fi Aware, such as efficiency improvements and addressing lost connections.