Xbox SmartGlass App Launches Friday for Windows Devices

When SmartGlass was first announced during Microsoft’s E3 conference this summer, I was pretty excited by the prospect of using a mobile device that I already own—like my phone or my tablet—to navigate and search on the Xbox 360. As the release of Windows 8 has drawn closer, and with today’s Xbox 360 dashboard update having finally gone to everyone, I thought my chance to use SmartGlass (which releases this Friday) had finally come.

Not so fast: turns out that while we were told SmartGlass would be available for all devices back at E3, it turns out that Friday’s launch will only be for Windows-powered phones and tablets. According to this post on Joystiq, the app won’t come out for iOS or Android devices until 2013—and when just isn’t clear.

If you watch the video above, we get a tour of how the SmartGlass app works—and it looks cool to me. There’s shared web-browsing among devices, remote Xbox control…I’m convinced, you know? I just don’t own a Windows device other than my PC. So…yeah. Kind of annoying that I have to wait to take advantage of the app. Or shell out at least $500 for a Surface tablet.

Anyway, all Windows tablets should have the app this Friday, while Windows phones will have access on October 29. As for the rest of us…stay tuned, I guess. Plenty more info to be found on Major Nelson’s blog, as well, FYI.

Via Joystiq and Major Nelson