We may have Android Pay sooner than we expected

Android Pay was unveiled alongside Android 6.0 “Marshmallow” at Google’s I/O developers conference in May.

We are excited to announce that we will have two new mobile payment options in all restaurants in August 2015.

Identity verification if provided through the phone’s fingerprint scanner, just like Apple’s Touch ID. As Android Police noted, “there’s no doubt Google would inform [McDonald’s] ahead of time of Pay’s approximate launch window, if only to prepare employees”. According to a company update, Google will initially launch Android Pay in the U.S., and up to that point, rumors about the service launching in McDonald’s stores seem correct.

Android already dominates the mobile OS space in Africa with an 89% market share, but that’s not good enough for Google – Apple was still one of the leading smartphone vendors in the continent in Q1 2015, along with Samsung and local vendor Tecno. However, Samsung said the UK would be the “first country in Europe” to get the new mobile payment service.

They all aim to turn phones into a contactless credit card, letting people pay by touching the handset on a reader – and allowing them to leave their phones at home. Service procedures are the same with Apple Pay; however, it is important that all managers and crew are aware of the change.

Now a leaked memo from the burger chain pegs 26 August as the date when Android Pay is going to greet the world (in the US at least): AndroidPolice has received several tip-offs about the same date in the calendar.

These rumours are to be taken with a pinch of salt – a typical serving of a small portion of chips contains 0.5g of salt – and Google is about as likely to confirm rumour and speculation as any of its peers, i.e. not very likely at all.