You can now play games on Google’s Stadia cloud gaming service on your Android phone via 4G and 5G connections, though you must opt for an “experiment,” Google announced today (via 9to5Google) Since the service launched in November 2019, you have only been able to play Stadia games on your phone via Wi-Fi, that is, unless you trick Stadia into playing over a cellular connection by connecting a laptop to a phone or access point, as my colleague Sean Hollister did as part of his review.
If you want to opt for the experiment, open the Stadia app on your Android phone, tap your avatar, select Experiments and then “Use mobile data”, according to Google.
Sean discovered that when he played Stadia over a 90 Mbps LTE connection for review, “the experience ranged from fully playable to annoyingly stuttering.” But that was in November 2019, and it’s unclear if Google has made any changes to make things run smoothly and more consistently when playing over a cellular network, especially when it comes to a direct connection (instead of of a connected one).
Today’s news is one of Stadia’s many notable updates since its release, including bringing the service to virtually any Android phone, allowing the Stadia controller to work wirelessly with Android devices, and launching a free version of the service.
