WiFi Aware is an OS-level feature that's being added in the upcoming Android O release. It also requires new hardware support, which means most phones don't sup

WiFi Aware is an OS-level feature that's being added in the upcoming Android O release. It also requires new hardware support, which means most phones don't support it yet. Nearby isn't using WiFi Aware. We want it to work on all existing Android devices. Internally, it's using a mix of WiFi, WiFi Direct, Bluetooth LE & Classic Bluetooth. Getting proximity-based P2P messaging to work correctly across all devices is complicated. With Nearby Connections, we're trying to provide an abstraction layer that makes it easy.