Google has introduced a new feature in its Google Photos app that is designed to compete with Apple's popular iCloud Photo Sharing which is still exclusive to iOS and OS X. Collaborating with all of a user's friends and family is difficult when not everyone has an iPhone and or a Mac device.

Google Photos's feature is called shared albums. It allows users share photos in an album with anyone they want. This feature was rolled out on Thursday, Dec. 10 on iOS, Android, and web. It was initially announced back in September at Google's event.

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Google Photos Product Lead David Lieb told TechCrunch about the different types of photo sharing that is popular and a lot of it happens on social networks. He also stated that shared albums is an important feature especially before the holidays. He mentioned that the Photos team took special care so that the feature was as simple to use as possible or else nobody will ever use it.

Google Photos, just like UpThere and previously Dropbox, wants to turn the black hole of phone photos into a goldmine. Shared albums allows users to toss photos into an album and invite people to view them or even add their own. A Google account or any app is not necessary to be able to view the photos being shared with others. But a Google account is necessary to add photos.

Once a user select a photo to share, a new album is created, or a new photo is just added to an existing album. Once an album is shared with others, a notification is sent to all that the album has been shared with. Allowing other people to add photos to the existing album is as simple as switching a toggle on or off.

TagsGoogle Photos, Shared Albums, web, OS X, iCloud, iPhones, Macs