6 Features and Tricks Of Google Drive You Should Know Today

Google Drive is a file storage and synchronization service developed by Google. Launched on April 24, 2012, Google Drive allows users to store files in the cloud, synchronize files across devices, and share files. Recently, Android users can easily backup their phones and tablets to cloud storage so that it can be accessed any day, anywhere and any time even if you lost your phone, your files and data will be saved and secured.

However, some people are ignorant of some interesting features of Google drive apart from the fact they can backup files through it. Some we have some features of Google Drive that you should know today.

1. REMOVE PHOTOS OUT OF RECENT VIEW

If you back up a lot of photos on Google Drive, they tend to clog up the Recent view, which makes looking for other files tedious. To solve this problem, type “-jpg” in the search field. All your photos will be filtered out, letting you browse other recent files you saved to the Drive.

2. TURN ON QUICK ACCESS

This feature turns on a belt of thumbnails across the top of the My Drive view. This gives you quick access to recently modified files, and it does not include photos. To set it up, go to the Settings section, and click the box for Make Relevant Files Handy when you need them. After that, refresh the page.

3. FILTER YOUR SEARCHES

In the search box at the top of Google Drive, there is a downward-pointing arrow along the right edge. Click it and you will get a panel of search options to filter your search results. If you have a large library of files, these search options will prove useful in narrowing your results. You can filter by file name, type, date modified and owner.

4. SEND LINKS TO FILES INSTEAD OF ATTACHMENTS

There is a little Drive icon at the bottom of Gmail’s compose window. It lets you attach files you stored in the Drive or simply send a link. For Google Drive formats – Docs, Sheets, Slides, etc., your only option is to send a link to the file. For other types – PDFs, Word documents, images, you can either send them as attachments or send a Drive link. This lets you share files larger than Gmail’s 25GB size limit for attachments.

5. QUICKLY CLEAR FORMATTING

There are a few options available for clearing the formatting for text you paste into Docs. You can highlight the text and select Normal text from the toolbar at the top. Or you can go to Format > Clear Formatting. You could also avoid clearing the formatting by holding Shift when you paste text.

6. ONE-TAP PHONE BACKUP

You can back up important data to Drive from your mobile phone. Simply go to Settings > Backup, and choose what you want to back up. When you are done, tap Start Backup. This might take a while, so you might want to plug your phone to a power source, connect to WiFi and go to bed. via

Note that Google drive now come as system app in almost all Android devices so it's likely to be there in your phone's app drawer. But if you don't have it, you can always download via Google Play.