Dropbox Responds To Tumblr’s Photoset App With New Photo-Focused Update On Android

Well, that didn’t take long. Almost immediately after Tumblr announced Photoset, its brand-new standalone iOS application for photo-sharing, Dropbox updated its Android app with similar functionality. In the new release, Dropbox has added a Photos tab to the app, which allows you to view all the photos and videos you’ve uploaded to Dropbox, and then easily share them.

That’s basically the same idea behind Photoset – it’s an app aiming to simplify photo-sharing by offering a quick way to upload photos to the cloud, where you can either keep them private or not. But Dropbox, too, has long since found popularity as a photo-sharing and archival tool. The only problem was that its current user interface on Android treated photos (and videos) more like files, instead of offering an attractive visual layout where you can easily see and browse through your media collection.

Now, that’s changed. In the updated Android app, photos and videos are organized by date uploaded, and you’ll also be able to see those you took using other cameras or devices in the new gallery. Here, you can swipe through the photos as you would in your Android Gallery app, so you no longer have to download the files to your phone in order to enjoy a more immersive experience. However, Dropbox has stopped short of making the grouped uploads by date their own individual collections (that is, “photosets”) where you could share the entire set with just one click. Instead, you’ll still need to share photos individually or organize them into folders for sharing a subset of your uploads.

Also a part of this update, Uploads have been moved to the menu in the file browser, and Dropbox says there are a few other under-the-hood bug fixes and tune-ups available as well. The new Dropbox app is now available for download from Google Play here. No word yet on whether or not the iOS version will also be updated in some way to put more emphasis on photos as well, but Dropbox has a history of going Android-first with some of its tweaks. For example, the Camera Uploads feature itself originally came to Android before making its way to iPhone.