If you stream video content often, you’ll love this new Play Store feature

If you love streaming movies and television shows on your phone, tablet, or computer, the one big problem you might encounter is finding out which platform a television show or movie can be found on. There are so many different platforms: Peacock, Disney+, Discovery, Paramount+, Netflix, Max, Pluto TV, and Amazon Prime to name a few. The Google Play Store is adding a card that will show you when and where a show you’re interested in will be streamed.

New “Where to watch” card in the Play Store will show which platform is streaming a show or movie you want to watch

The example used by Google in the blog post shows a search for the HBO television series “The Last of Us.” The screen shot displayed by Google reveals that the show can be streamed on HBO Max, viewed on YouTube TV: Live, and streamed on Prime Video. No pricing appears on the card. While that would be important information for Google to share, it also could be hard to add because of the various subscription tiers that streamers offer.

The card does include a button for each app showing your content. This allows you to install on your device each streaming service listed for a particular show or movie and also shows the ratings that a show received on each platform. These ratings can vary widely. For example, “The Last of Us” received 4.8 stars on HBO Max, 3.9 on YouTube TV: Live, and 4.0 for Prime Video. Perhaps a single rating from a well-respected service such as IMDb would be more useful.

Since the Google Play Store is an Android app storefront, we shouldn’t be so surprised that the main goal of what Google is giving us here is a way to find and install video streaming apps for Android users. If this were more than just an app discovery feature, Google could have added the day and time each show is streamed over the platform shown. At the same time, Google could have given the user an opportunity to set an alarm or notification to remind the user that it is showtime.

Here is the name of an app that does a better job than “Where to watch”

An app that you might want to install instead of relying on “Where to watch” is the app version of the once popular TV Guide. At one time, TV Guide was one of the most popular weekly magazines with a circulation of 20 million copies per week. As of last year, the circulation is down to 900,000 copies distributed weekly.

The TV Guide app will also show you listings for broadcast channels and cable systems in your area.

As for the Play Store’s “Where to watch,” this new card just might come in handy that one cold night this winter when your fireplace is radiating warmth and there is something specific you’re in the mood to watch only you don’t know which platform it is on.

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