Android is Google’s open-source mobile operating system; think of it like a public park compared to Apple’s walled garden. It dates back to 2007, and though its dessert-inspired version names were retired in 2019 for a straightforward numbering system, there will always be a special place in our hearts for an OS called “Oreo” and “Ice Cream Sandwich.
You’ll be able to share the location of trackers in its Find Hub network (formerly Find My Device) with airline staff when you need to find lost luggage, just like you already can with Apple’s AirTags. Support won’t arrive until “early next year” though, and only on five airlines — while Apple supports over 15.
Google is celebrating another RCS milestone, and this one’s a doozy: one billion messages sent in the US every day. Considering RCS had just reached one billion total monthly users at the end of 2023, it’s a big jump. That’s no doubt thanks to Apple turning on RCS support in iOS 18 and making it the default protocol when you’re not on iMessage. Sure doesn’t hurt!
Announced during today’s pre-I/O event, it’s called Material 3 Expressive. It adds more customization options and lots of colors and animations. It’ll drop as part of the Android 16 beta, which will also support Live Updates.
Everyone pretend like we didn’t just see it all last week.
We’re expecting to see Google’s colorful new design language as part of the Android pre-I/O show. New colors are fun! Fun is good! But I’m not sure Google can show us something “cool” enough to win the hearts of iPhone-loving teenagers.
Google’s designers want to capture the youth demo with a vibrant new OS treatment, but there’s only so much they can do.
The company is teasing its next launch, presumably the Xperia 1 VII, which it will reveal on May 13th (well, in Japan — it’ll be the evening of May 12th in the US). The teaser shows off a familiar design and some Alpha camera features.
Last’s year’s Xperia 1 VI never launched in the US, and with no US time zones mentioned, a repeat of that looks likely too.
Only the albums’ owner can make changes, with the option to save the edits just to their own gallery as a copy or also to the shared album, Google writes in a help page. The feature is already live in Google Photos on the web and in iOS, and is now coming to the Android version of the app, as well, as Android Authority notes.
[androidauthority.com]
Android whisperer Mishaal Rahman has a thorough writeup for Android Authority detailing some of the potential UI changes he’s found under the hood in Android 16’s beta releases. One that caught my eye: the ability to resize quick settings tiles and a new tile editor organized by category, which is all very iOS 18. There are other visual changes afoot too, like more use of background blur on screens like the app drawer and the multitasking view. No doubt we’ll find out more soon.
Nearly one year ago, Google said it would upgrade its photo picker with a way to search your local or cloud library to find specific photos to share with an app. Now, Android Authority contributor Kamila Wojciechowska has spotted the feature on her device, hopefully saving you from digging through countless photos.
It’s still not clear when Google plans to widely roll this out, though Android Authority notes that it’s “enabled in recent Google Play System Updates” but not yet on Google Photos.
[androidauthority.com]
After the September Pixel Watch update to Wear OS 5 ran into issues, Google released a fix in November and said its wearables would have to wait until March for another update.
However, that March update and Google’s first attempt at an April update introduced some bugs of their own, and now it’s rolling out the April update again (version BP1A.250305.019.W8) to hopefully get Pixel Watch owners on Wear OS 5.1 without all of those problems.
[support.google.com]
Apologies to the three people out there nostalgic for Acer phones — the new Super ZX and Super ZX Pro handsets announced in India today are made under license by Indkal Technologies, meaning Acer itself has almost nothing to do with them. The same is true for last month’s two budget Acerpure models.
The last true Acer phone was 2016’s Android 6-powered Liquid Z6 Plus, which boasted a 13-megapixel camera and 32GB of storage.
That’s the new minimum storage for Android 15 devices to license Google Mobile Services, a requirement if you want to support the Play Store, according to Android Authority. In practice you’d have to work pretty hard to find any Android device with that little storage anyway, but it’s still good to see Android’s lowest storage bar raised a bit higher.
[androidauthority.com]
The OnePlus 13T will launch in China on April 24th, though we don’t know if or when it’ll launch elsewhere. The design is a little new for OnePlus, and we already know it will ditch the fan-favorite alert slider for a new shortcut button. It’s small, too, though only by modern standards — its 6.32-inch screen is still bigger than the iPhone 16’s.
That’s what the company told Ars Technica when asked about the current pause to the much-delayed update, which brings Android 15 to the Galaxy S24 series and other devices from 2024 and earlier. It was halted following reports of a bug that stopped people unlocking their phones. There’s no word on when the company will resume the rollout.
“The One UI 7 rollout schedule is being updated to ensure the best possible experience. The new timing and availability will be shared shortly.”
[arstechnica.com]
