I found a trick to easily check for new Android updates — here's how

I don’t know about you, but on any given week, I manually check for new Google Play System updates, new betas, new monthly patches, or new QPRs at least a few times. But dropping down the notifications shade or opening the app drawer to tap Settings, scrolling down, finding System, and then the Software updates section gets tedious and annoying time after time.

This is especially true when a hot new Android 17 beta is supposedly being released right away, and I have to keep checking for the OTA every few minutes to see if it’s available — well, uh, before Google pulls the rug and tells us the beta will be a bit delayed. But I digress. The point is: I wanted a faster shortcut to get to updates, and I found two tricks to get it.

The easy way: Use the Settings widget

The most obvious solution to my update mania came to me yesterday, mid-Android 17 beta rush. I remembered that Android has had, since time immemorial, a Settings widget that lets you transform different settings sub-menus into home screen shortcuts. Thankfully, this widget is still there in Android 16, and it still does the job. So, here’s what I did:

• Create a new home screen widget.
• Click Browse to open the full list of widgets and pick the Settings widget.
• Drop it on my home screen, which pops up a menu with choices between all the available settings menus.
• Scroll down, find System, and choose it.

Done. This transforms the new widget icon into a direct shortcut to the System settings menu, where I can easily tap Software updates. I know it sounds silly, but this saves me a couple of taps and swipes each time I want to check for a new update, and I absolutely love anything that can save me the teeniest amount of time. When your job revolves around checking for and downloading updates on multiple phones, it’s also a crucial productivity hack.

Create a direct shortcut to Software updates

The solution above has one tiny flaw: It only opens the System settings menu and still requires me to tap once to get to the actual software updates section. And as I said, I love anything that can save me time, so I decided to check if Android surfaces an “activity” to go directly to that section. Yes, it does.

Activities on Android are essentially a screen or page within an app that can serve as an entry point and can be linked to directly, bypassing the app’s main menu. For example, apps can link directly to Gmail’s compose message screen. Most apps have several exposed activities, and there are launchers (Niagara or Nova Launcher, among others) or shortcut apps that can use this to create custom shortcuts. I prefer to stick with the default launcher on my Pixel, so I used the free Shortcut Maker app to fix my issue:

• Open Shortcut Maker and choose Settings in the top shortcut icons.
• Choose Settings Activities.
• Search for “update” and select com.google.android.settings.update.SoftwareUpdateActivity.
• You can now edit the name of the shortcut, its icon, and lock it. I suggest at least renaming it to “Updates” to make things clearer.
• When you’re done, tap Create Shortcut, then Add to home screen.

This will create a new home screen shortcut that immediately opens the software update screen in Settings, bypassing the System page and anything else in between. And it’s one of the best shortcuts I’ve made in recent times.

Of course, I realize I’m in a very small minority here with my constant and niche need to check for Android updates. But if you’re reading this article, chances are you’re at least a little bit interested in speeding up the update process on your phone, so I hope one of these two solutions helps you cut down on time lost doing so.