Google Wallet adds email integration to Android handsets

Google Wallet may have passed the in-store and in-app payments baton to Android Pay late in 2015, but it has simplified its person-to-person payment capabilities by extending its Gmail integration to Android phones.

The system, which has long been a feature of Gmail on the web, allows users to send funds as though they were email attachments, according to a March 14 blog post by Google product manager Sam Kansara.

Following the launch of Android Pay, Google Wallet was stripped down to a P-to-P app that still operated through the web and mobile phones. Android Pay took over as a streamlined version of Google's mobile wallet, operating similar to Apple Pay.

The service is currently available in the U.S. only on the web and Android devices. Gmail is Google's webmail service.

Late last year, Google Wallet expanded its P-to-P menu with a new website devoted, in part, to giving the wallet's payment capabilities a boost.