Google’s virtual Firebase Summit 2021 kicked off today, and we’re getting some new features for Firebase. Google’s Firebase is a pretty comprehensive set of development tools. Its goal is to make app development and maintenance easier, with features like detailed crash reporting, user analytics, authentication, and storage. Google has been constantly working to improve Firebase, most recently announcing new extensions for Firebase at Google I/O 21. Now, Google has announced that Firebase offers beta level support for tvOS and macOS, along with support for Apple TV and Apple Arcade too.

firebase summit 2021 macos tvos

What this essentially means is that developers can now use Firebase products to build and run apps that are compatible with Apple TVs and Macbooks. It works from a single codebase to deliver a cross-device experience to users with less hassle. An example of this is with the  Crashlytics SDK, as developers can identify critical crashes and even filter crashes by Apple device type or operating system right from the Firebase Crashlytics console.

Game developers also get some pretty big improvements when developing for Apple TV and Apple Arcade. Many of the Firebase C++ SDKs now support Apple TV, meaning that you can develop Apple Arcade games with Firebase! On top of that, we’re Google announced that it's expanding support for game frameworks and engines by making Cloud Firestore available for Unity and C++. This means that you can add Cloud Firestore to your game in order to store and sync your game data in near real-time, add offline support, and scale your game's experience to reach a large number of people.

If you're unfamiliar, Cloud Firestore is a NoSQL database for mobile, web, and server development. It's cross-platform, and developers can create Apple, Android, and web apps that use native SDKs to retrieve information from it. It simplifies data syncing across devices for end users.