Google Play services Preview for Wear

Google Play services 5.0 is currently being rolled out to the world. We usually wait to release the Google Play services SDK until the rollout completes. This ensures that your newly-updated apps can run on the most devices as possible.

However, if you want to develop for Android Wear now, complete the following steps to get special access to all the things you need to start developing, without waiting for the rollout to complete.

Warning: Do not publish any apps that are built with Google Play services SDK 5.0 until the rollout is completed over the coming days. Your apps will break on most user devices, which will degrade your apps’ user experience. We’ll publish an update to the Android Developer blog when the rollout is done.

1. Get Whitelisted for the Preview

If you attended Google I/O, your registered Google account is automatically whitelisted for these preview resources. You're done! Head to Step 2.

If you didn't attend Google I/O or want to use a different account, click following link to and get whitelisted.

Join the Preview Group

2. Download Required Apps

You'll need the following apps to get the most out of Android Wear. You must be whitelisted in the Preview Group above and you must install these apps in this exact order:

  1. Google Play services: Allows your Android Wear device to communicate with your handheld device. This is required to use the Android Wear app and other apps listed below.
  2. Google Search: Enables searches from Android Wear
  3. Android Wear Companion: The app for pairing a handheld to a wearable and providing syncing of notifications and data

    4. Note: After becoming a tester, it can take up to 1 hour to get access to the preview versions of these apps.

To obtain these apps from Google Play, click each app link above and follow these instructions, preferably from your mobile browser:

  1. Click the Become a Tester button to opt-in to the preview version of the app. The page confirms that you're a tester after clicking.
  2. Click the Download <app name> from the Play Store link to go to Google Play Store download page to get the app. The following screenshot shows how the opt-in process looks like:

3. Download Optional Apps

Please join the Test Group and install the following apps to enhance your Android Wear experience:

  1. Google Keep: Supports the "Take a note" command
  2. Google I/O 2014: Supports session feedback from Android Wear

4. Start Building

The Google Play services SDK is required if you want to sync and send data between wearable and handheld devices. To get the new SDK that is compatible with the Google Play services APK that you just installed, follow these steps:

Note: Android Studio is required for Wear development.

  1. Download and install Android Studio
  2. Start SDK Manager.
  3. Update the Android SDK Tools and Platform-tools to versions 23 and 20 respectively.
  4. Click Tools > Manage Add-on Sites > User Defined Sites.
  5. Click New, enter https://dl-ssl.google.com/android/repository/addon-play-services-5.xml into the text field, and click OK.
  6. Click Close. You should now see new emulator images that support this preview release of Google Play services and the Google Play services client libraries you need to start developing.
  7. Download the Google Play services reference documentation for this preview release.
    8. .

When you're done here, check out the Building Apps for Wearables training classes for information on how to build for Wear.