What’s changing
To learn more about the beta and to apply, see here.
Who’s impacted
Admins and end usersWhy you’d use it
This feature helps complete the offline experience for Google Drive. Now, users can access their important non-Google files in an offline setting, like when they’re traveling or when there’s poor internet connectivity.How to get started
- Admins:
- To apply to this beta, you must enable Drive File Stream use and installation for your domain, and enable offline for the domain and devices.
- Apply to join the beta here.
- Note: Admins who opted into the Alpha for offline for Docs, Sheets, and Slides will automatically be whitelisted for this beta.
- End users:
- First, enable offline from within the Drive or Docs settings.
- Next, sign into Chrome with the account associated with the whitelisted Google Group and access Drive File Stream.
- To mark the non-Google files as available offline, right click on a file and select “Make available offline.” You can use the offline preview feature as well.
Additional details
Note that while this feature is not currently supported in ChromeOS, we’re working on bringing these offline capabilities to ChromeOS in the future.Additionally, users can also right click and open any non-Google files using native applications. By doing so, you can make an Office file available offline and—while offline—open that file using the native Microsoft Office application.
Helpful links
- Apply for the Google Drive Offline for Binary Content beta
- Set up offline access to Docs editors
- Use Google Drive files offline
- Viewing and opening files in Google Drive
Availability
G Suite editions- Available to all G Suite editions
On/off by default?
- Once accepted into the beta, this feature is ON by default when:
- Offline is enabled for the domain.
- Users have Drive File Stream installed and offline is enabled in Google Drive or Google Docs settings.