Google Now Cards Branching Out Into 70 New Apps

The number of Google Now partners is going up. Google premiered the Google Now cards program in January of this year with 40 third-party partners; another 70 are now looping in, bringing the total pool of Now partners up to 110.

So which apps are tied into Google Now?

Zipcar is – and its cards will display reservation end times so that users can be sure to get their automobile back on time and avoid penalties. Spotify will tap into the program to make playlist suggestions based on a user’s current habits and other contextual information (like time of day). ABC News and Circa seem to be bent on using the service to compete with Twitter and will have the pop-up cards deliver breaking news. OpenTable is even tying payments directly to Google Now, as users will be able to settle the check from Now.

To use the app, a consumer needs the latest version of the Google App and the updated version of the partner’s native mobile app. This is a staged rollout, meaning Google is not just opening the floodgates for any merchant. However, the 70 third-party players in this round nearly double the 40 last round – so it seems at least that Google is ramping up Now’s rollout.

The full list of apps now on Google Now enhanced is available here.