Google may soon let you choose from cast devices when you use the audio output switch on Android 13, according to Esper‘s Mishal Rahman. The output switcher, first introduced in Android 11, currently only allows you to switch between media playback sessions on paired Bluetooth devices, such as wireless headphones or a speaker.
But an update to the Google Cast SDK (software development kit), suggests that Android 13’s output switcher enables local-to-remote, remote-to-local, and remote-to-remote transfers. As Rahman points out, “local” refers to transfers with paired Bluetooth devices, while “remote” refers to cast devices.
This should allow you to seamlessly transfer media sessions from your phone to a smart display and back again using your lock screen’s audio output switch. You can see what this can look like in a demo posted by Rahman, who also shows off an upcoming “stream extension” feature that lets you enable audio playback on multiple cast devices at once. Rahman encountered some bugs while trying out the functionality, so it looks like it’s not finished yet.
Back in 2020, Google was working on adding support for cast devices in the output switcher, but for whatever reason, it never got finalized. However, with Google outlining the feature in developer docs, it looks like we might finally see it come to fruition in a future update.