Google is one of the biggest tech companies on the planet thanks to its ubiquitous search engine, but it also makes Pixel smartphones and tons of apps and software used by millions of people every day. Despite its status, the company has an annoying habit of killing software features or even entire apps momentarily — and that’s exactly what happened again.
Google is discontinuing the VPN – that’s ‘virtual private network’ – tool that it currently includes as a feature in its Google One software subscription packages. It will disappear from the service in the coming months.
A subscription to Google One for Android and iPhone includes cloud storage along with Google Photos features, dark web monitoring, and other perks depending on how much you pay monthly or annually. The VPN is present in all plans in 22 countries, including the UK, but Google confirmed to 9to5Google that the feature is being removed because “people just weren’t using it”. The tech giant also said that the end of the VPN will allow for a “refocus” on “supporting more in-demand features with Google One.” The company did not say what those features are.
VPNs are a useful security feature. Turning one on protects your IP address, especially useful if you’re using unsecured public Wi-Fi and are concerned about potential hackers accessing your device or data—a real possibility. A VPN gives you the peace of mind of safe surfing wherever you are, including abroad.
In February, Google confirmed that it had 100 million subscribers to Google One. Although the VPN was not available in all countries to all of these people, it must not have been used much at all for Google to get rid of it. It’s only been available since 2020, but now the only way to access Google’s VPN service after it goes down is on the Pixel 7 and newer Pixel phones, where the VPN is built-in and free to use.
Google is no stranger to killing software services, even popular ones. Google Podcasts, a standalone podcast app, was recently dumped, and podcasts have been pushed into YouTube Music as Google tries to pry you away from Spotify and other all-in-one audio subscription apps.
In fact, Google shuts down so many apps, features, and products that there’s a website called Killed by Google dedicated to tracking anything that falls victim to Google’s guillotine. It currently contains 295 items.