Google is releasing Android 13’s Photo Picker feature to all phones running its OS

On Android 13, Google introduced a new and smoother Photo Picker that allows users to select photos or videos and put them into another app. The feature has been around for some time now but the one introduced in Android 13 allows users to restrict access to the entire photo library, essentially making it a more privacy-friendly offering. As per the latest development, Google is making this version available to virtually all Android smartphones.
The updated Photo Picker feature has been made available to older Android phones as a part of its Play Services package in the November 2022 Google System Updates. “Enable photo picker support back to Android 4.4,” Google said in the release notes. Android 4.4 was released nine years ago and received its last update in 2017.
The company says that Google System Updates make Android devices more secure and give users new features. Google System Updates include updates to the Android operating system, Google Play Store, and Google Play services.

What is Photo Picker
As per the explanation by Google, Android 13 adds a system photo picker that helps protect photo and video privacy of users. The “system” is a standard and optimised way for users to share both local and cloud-based photos securely. Google also said that apps can use the photo picker APIs to access shared photos and videos without needing permission to view all media files on the device.
Other November 2022 Google System features
Google also released other updates on the Play store. These include new features to help users quickly discover the apps and games, optimisations to facilitate faster and more reliable download and installation, improvements to Play Protect to keep Android devices safe, performance optimisations, bug fixes and improvements to security stability as well as accessibility.