Google brings to peer-to-peer payments to Assistant on Android, soon Google Home

No more bugging friends, or having friends bug you, for that drink money.

Google has announced that it is bringing a popular feature of Google Wallet, peer-to-peer payments, to Assistant on Android and iOS this week.

Peer-to-peer payments were sequestered to the Wallet app for many years before recently being subsumed into the Google Pay app itself under the brand Pay Send. Now users can ask Assistant to do all the hard work, as long as the user has the contact in his or her address book.

When the weekend's over, chances are someone owes you (or you owe someone) money for something—Friday night's concert tickets, Saturday afternoon's barbecue supplies, or Sunday's matinee at the movies. Starting today, you can ask the Google Assistant to pay your friends back with Google Pay, so you can spend more time having fun and less time dealing with the hassle of paying each other back.

You can easily send or request money from your contacts—for free—using the Assistant on Android and iOS phones in the U.S. In the coming months, you'll be able to send money on voice-activated speakers like Google Home.

No worries if you haven't already signed up for Google Pay—you'll be prompted to set up your account as soon as you ask the Assistant to send money to your contacts. Funds are transferred almost instantaneously, even if the recipient doesn't have a Google Pay account. Your friends and family will receive an email, text message, or notification if they already have the Google Pay app installed, so they can cash out.

Google says the functionality will roll out to Google Home devices in "the coming months."