Android 16 has reached Platform Stability with Beta 3. The API floor is locked, app-facing behaviors are ultimate, and now you can push Android 16-targeted apps to the Play Retailer.
The Android 16 beta now helps Auracast broadcast audio with suitable LE Audio listening to aids on Pixel 9 units, It introduces define textual content, changing excessive distinction textual content, which pulls a bigger contrasting space round textual content to enormously enhance legibility for customers with low imaginative and prescient, and provides the flexibility to check the Native Community Safety function, which provides customers extra management over which apps can entry units on their native community.
Ensure to check your apps for compatibility now, as the discharge is coming to non-beta customers quickly with modifications to JobScheduler, broadcasts, ART, Intents, accessibility, Bluetooth, and extra.
Android Studio now has Gemini in Android Studio for companies by means of Gemini Code Help to fulfill the privateness, safety, and administration wants of organizations.
With Gemini Code Help, your code stays safe with an information governance coverage, you keep management and possession of your information and IP, and also you profit from generative AI IP indemnification, safeguarding in opposition to copyright infringement claims associated to AI-generated code.
With a Code Help Enterprise license, you’ll be able to hook up with your GitHub, GitLab, or BitBucket repositories to get help custom-made to your group’s codebases. Gemini in Android Studio additionally gives tailor-made help for Android builders, with options like construct and sync error help, Gemini-powered App High quality Insights, and assist with Logcat crashes.
Gemini in Android Studio now helps multimodal inputs, permitting you to connect photos on to prompts. To do that out, obtain the most recent Android Studio canary.
With the picture attachment icon within the Gemini chat window, you’ll be able to connect JPEG or PNG information to prompts. You may convert wireframes or mockups into Jetpack Compose code, achieve insights into structure or information move diagrams, and troubleshoot UI bugs by importing screenshots and asking Gemini for options.
Samsung’s One UI 7 gives higher personalization and an optimized, extra distinguished widget expertise. Widgets put your model and key options entrance and heart on the person’s gadget, main to higher person engagement and extra. Google Play now has a devoted widgets search filter to assist extra simply determine apps with widgets, new widget badges on App Element Pages and a curated widgets editorial web page to assist apps with widgets achieve visibility and attain a wider viewers.
We simply completed the Widget Highlight week, overlaying our new widget High quality Tiers, Canonical Layouts, the brand new Figma Widget Design Equipment, Jetpack Look, and the Coding Widgets format video plus codelab that will help you design and construct wonderful widgets.
Android and Google Play had a bunch of bulletins on the annual Sport Builders Convention (GDC) final month in San Francisco.
Android introduced that Vulkan is now the official graphics API, unlocking options like ray tracing and multithreading. In case your recreation makes use of OpenGL, Android will use ANGLE to translate OpenGL to Vulkan.
The Android Dynamic Efficiency Framework (ADPF) has been up to date to offer longer and smoother gameplay periods. ADPF is designed to work throughout a spread of units and gives built-in help with recreation engines.
Play Console will embrace Low Reminiscence Killers (LMK) in Android Vitals, offering insights into reminiscence constraints that may trigger your recreation to crash.
There’s a pilot program to simplify bringing PC video games to cell, with video games akin to DREDGE and TABS Cell rising their cell viewers utilizing this program.
Google Play is bettering its platform for PC video games, offering higher person experiences and new methods for builders to have interaction PC gamers.
You should utilize the Play Video games PC SDK for native PC video games on Google Play Video games, offering instruments like in-app buy integration and safety safety. You may distribute by means of the Play Console, the place you’ll be able to handle each cell and PC recreation builds. There’s a new earnback program that means that you can earn as much as a further 15% while you carry your PC video games to Google Play Video games on PC.
Cell video games can be accessible on PC by default, with the choice to choose out. Video games could have a playability badge indicating their compatibility with PC. We’re partnering with OEMs to make Google Play Video games accessible from the beginning menu on new units this 12 months. New options akin to customized controls at the moment are accessible to assist gamers tailor their setup, and multi-account and multi-instance help are being added.
As well as, Play Factors can be simpler to trace and extra rewarding on PC, with as much as 10x factors boosters, and Google is engaged on an answer that will help you run person acquisition campaigns for each emulated cell and native PC titles inside Google Play Video games on PC.
We introduced the Android XR developer preview, a unified platform for XR improvement utilizing acquainted instruments and Open Requirements. You should utilize Android Studio, Jetpack libraries, and Compose for XR (for simplified UI improvement). Unity builders get help for Unity’s editor and XR packages. Apps can be distributed through the Play Retailer. Key options embrace eye, voice, and hand multimodal enter, Android accessibility options, computerized adaptation of your current large-screen suitable apps, Jetpack XR SDK with ARCore, and Unity help based mostly on OpenXR.
Google is enhancing security and safety on Google Play and Android by offering instruments that make it simpler so that you can construct safe apps.
Listed here are a few of the methods Google is bettering the app ecosystem:
- Play Console pre-review checks now embrace the flexibility to test privateness coverage hyperlinks and login credential necessities. Extra pre-review checks are deliberate for this 12 months.
- Notifications in Android Studio provide you with a warning to related insurance policies as you code. This 12 months, the notifications will increase to cowl a wider vary of insurance policies.
- Google is bettering its coverage expertise to offer you clearer updates and extra time for substantial modifications.
- The Google Play Developer Assist Neighborhood can be expanded to incorporate extra languages, akin to Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, and Portuguese.
- Apps utilizing the Play Integrity API options are seeing an 80% drop in unauthorized utilization on common in comparison with different apps.
- Google will improve the Play Integrity API with stronger safety for much more customers and is bettering the know-how that powers the API on all units working Android 13 (API degree 33) and above.
- Badges can be added to extra app classes sooner or later.
- Credential Supervisor API is now in Beta for Digital IDs.
- Google Play Defend dwell menace detection is increasing its safety to focus on malicious functions that attempt to impersonate monetary apps.
The Google Play staff lined how one can prioritize media privateness in your app, recommending requesting solely important permissions, and utilizing the Android Picture Picker as a substitute of requesting broad storage entry. Be clear with customers about why your app wants entry to their photographs and movies if you happen to’re utilizing a customized picker.
#WeArePlay talked about how Reminiscence Lane Video games helps folks with dementia, and the way they’re providing deeply private video games in a number of languages. Co-founder Bruce was impressed by his mom and co-founder Peter’s mom, who, regardless of having vascular dementia, lit up when taking a look at previous household photographs.
The creators try for frustration-free recreation design and Generative AI could also be used to create customized and localized recreation content material, with the aim to supply deeply private video games in a number of languages.
Nevin lined frequent media processing operations with Jetpack Media 3 Transformer, together with frequent modifying operations akin to:
- Transcoding: Re-encode an enter file right into a specified output format.
- Trimming: Set Transformer as much as trim the enter video from a begin to finish level.
- Muting: Mute the audio within the exported video file.
- Resizing: Resize the enter video by scaling it down (or up) to a specified peak and width.
Transformer prioritizes transmuxing (repackaging video streams with out re-encoding) for fundamental video edits the place potential. When not potential, Transformer falls again to transcoding (decoding video samples into uncooked information, then re-encoding them for storage in a brand new container).
Jolanda confirmed tips on how to implement easy transitions for foldable units coming into tabletop mode utilizing CameraX and Compose. Key takeaways embrace:
- Leveraging Adaptive APIs: Replace dependencies to make the most of the most recent animation and adaptive APIs, together with Compose 1.8 and material3-adaptive.
- Using Rulers: Use Compose 1.7.0’s rulers (accessible through currentWindowAdaptiveInfo()) to find out hinge place for format changes.
- Animating Bounds: Make use of Modifier.animateBounds() inside a LookaheadScope to animate composable bounds throughout mode transitions (flat to tabletop).
- Utilizing Animated Visibility: Think about using AnimatedVisibility to create a dynamic management panel that may be positioned relative to the hinge.
Since Android 16 requires you to make WebViews edge-to-edge, Ash lined greatest practices for doing so, akin to:
- In the event you don’t personal the WebView content material, wrap the WebView and pad it.
- In the event you do personal the content material, use the `viewport-fit=cowl` meta tag, CSS variables for secure space insets, and JavaScript to inject padding. Deal with IME insets to keep away from keyboard overlap.
Cyril over at Amo lined how they leveraged Jetpack Compose to create a pleasant person expertise by means of touch-based suggestions utilizing graphics, haptics, and sound. Bump’s implementation of customized audio, shader-based animations, and interactive map parts are all constructed with the Android SDK, Jetpack Compose, Kotlin, and Google Play Providers.
Google Play’s April 2025 coverage updates impression Android builders in a number of key areas:
- Information Apps: New insurance policies require Information and Journal apps to finish a self-declaration type, replace Play Retailer listings, repeatedly replace content material with named sources, and keep away from affiliate internet marketing/advert income focus.
- Monetary Providers (Line of Credit score): Apps facilitating strains of credit score at the moment are included underneath private mortgage insurance policies, prohibiting entry to delicate person information and requiring adherence to stricter permission insurance policies.
- Person Knowledge: New greatest practices emphasize compliance with information safety legal guidelines (e.g., GDPR) and supply sources for doing so. Common compliance checks are really helpful.
- Images & Movies: Reminder that apps accessing photographs and movies require a declaration type by Might 28, 2025, and should solely entry them for direct performance functions.
Christopher, Nam, and Carmen lined how the Android staff is working to enhance Android app startup efficiency, specializing in bridging the efficiency hole between preliminary launch and subsequent runs. Key takeaways embrace:
- Baseline Profiles & Dex Optimization: Essential for bettering startup time.
- Keep away from JIT Compilation: Establish and strategically load costly dependencies to attenuate just-in-time compilation.
- Perfetto Traces: Use Perfetto to debug efficiency points and confirm optimization modifications.
SDK Runtime
We’ve obtained two new movies overlaying the SDK Runtime, a brand new technique to work with third get together code in your app.
Anatomy of the SDK Runtime covers how the SDK Runtime within the Privateness Sandbox isolates third-party SDKs into their very own sandboxes, enhancing person privateness and app safety. Key takeaways:
- SDKs run in their very own course of, separate from the primary app.
- Android SDK Bundles (ASBs) are the distribution format.
- Improvement targets Android 11+, with Jetpack offering backward compatibility.
- SDKs have restricted permissions and communication.
- Jetpack simplifies inter-process communication.
Introduction to the SDK Runtime covers the options and advantages of the tech each for you and in your app’s customers. The SDK Runtime isolates third-party Software program Improvement Kits (SDKs) — frequent sources of app performance like advertisements or analytics — right into a separate setting. Advantages of this embrace:
- Enhanced Privateness: Restricts SDK entry to delicate person information.
- Improved Safety: Helps forestall malicious SDK habits and advert fraud.
- Elevated Stability: Reduces app crashes brought on by third-party code.
- Quicker Updates: Permits for faster deployment of SDK safety patches.
Try the brand new runtime to assist construct safer and personal experiences.
The Google Play “Better of 2024” awards highlighted Infinite Painter which decreased inking latency by 5x utilizing the graphics core and enter movement prediction Jetpack libraries.
Compose for Android TV means that you can reuse current enterprise logic and structure out of your cell apps to speed up TV app improvement, and this Compose for TV video from Paul exhibits you ways. The really helpful method is to separate enterprise logic from UI-specific view fashions, enabling the creation of devoted TV UIs utilizing TV-specific Compose parts (from the TV materials artifact) with focus administration options like `onFocusChanged` and `bringIntoViewSpec`. Constructing a modular structure with shared UI parts, area fashions, and information layers enhances code reuse throughout type elements.
There’s a bunch of latest stuff in AndroidX, headlining:
Media3 model 1.6.0 is now accessible, which incorporates bug fixes, efficiency enhancements, and new options.
- ExoPlayer now helps HLS interstitials for advert insertion in HLS streams.
- You may allow experimental help for pre-warming decoders on the
DefaultRenderersFactory. - A brand new
media3-ui-composemodule is accessible for constructing Compose UIs for playback. MediaExtractorCompatis a drop-in substitute for the frameworkMediaExtractorhowever applied utilizing Media3’s extractors.- You should utilize the brand new
ExperimentalFrameExtractorclass to retrieve video frames. - Dolby Imaginative and prescient streams at the moment are supported for transcoding/transmuxing on units that help this format.
Jetpack WindowManager 1.4 is now steady, introducing new options for constructing adaptive apps.
- WindowSizeClass API is up to date to help customized values.
- Exercise stack pinning gives a technique to hold an exercise stack all the time on display.
- Pane growth permits you to create a visible separation between two actions in split-screen mode.
- Dialog full-screen dim permits you to select to dim simply the container the place the dialog seems or the complete job window.
- Enhanced posture help means that you can entry the
WindowInfoTracker#supportedPosturesAPI to find out if a tool helps tabletop mode.
The Well being Join Jetpack SDK is now in beta. The beta launch contains necessary recording strategies and gadget varieties for extra correct and insightful information.
New permissions let your app entry Well being Join information whereas working within the background, if the person grants consent. The PERMISSION_READ_HEALTH_DATA_HISTORY permission permits entry to person information past the default 30-day window.
Well being Join now additionally gives expanded information varieties, akin to Train Routes and pores and skin temperature.
Android app builders ought to be aware that Lifecycle 2.9.0-alpha08 introduces ViewModelScenario for simpler unit testing of ViewModels. This new instrument simplifies testing ViewModel lifecycle and state restoration, together with SavedStateHandle performance, and ensures ViewModel.onCleared() is correctly referred to as. ViewModelScenario can also be KMP suitable, facilitating cross-platform improvement.
Different Highlights:
androidx.core:core-i18n:1.0.0:
- A major new library designed to simplify internationalization (i18n) in Android apps. It gives improved date/time formatting that respects person settings (not like
android.icu.textual content.MessageFormat) and gives a backport ofandroid.icu.textual content.MessageFormatthat integrates properly with the brand new date/time formatting. That is necessary if you wish to help various locales and person preferences for date and time show.
androidx.webkit:webkit:1.14.0-alpha01:
- Introduces the
PaymentRequestAPI to permit Android native cost apps to be invoked from aWebView, however builders should explicitly allow it and add aWebViewnavigation monitoring andWebViewCompat#saveStateto handle WebView state saving.
androidx.datastore:datastore-:1.2.0-alpha01:
- Provides a datastore-guava module to reveal APIs pleasant to Java and Guava
ListenableFuturecustomers throughGuavaDataStore. Additionally helpsDataStoreutilization throughoutDirectBootmode, requiring creation inside Machine Protected storage.
androidx.put on:wear-phone-interactions:1.1.0:
- Features a crucial bug repair for Put on OS 5 (API 34+) apps concentrating on API 35+. Replace earlier than* concentrating on API 35 to keep away from runtime exceptions.
androidx.dynamicanimation:dynamicanimation:1.1.0:
- The
DynamicAnimationlibrary is now steady.
androidx.exercise:exercise:1.11.0-beta01:
- Added
MediaCapabilitiesAPI toPickVisualMediaRequestto let functions specify its media capabilities.
androidx.video games libraries:
- Upgrades to Gradle 8.8.1 and Java 17, fixes bugs.
games-frame-pacingcontains numerous bug fixes.
Tor, Chet, Romain, Theresa, and Naheed took a deep dive into what Google’s doing round app security, together with the SDK Index, pre-review checks, and Security Labels that will help you construct safe apps and shield customers from suspicious exercise, tying into the Strengthening our app ecosystem weblog publish.
That’s it for this version, with third beta of Android 16, Gemini in Android Studio for Enterprise and Gemini Multimodal, Widgets, GDC bulletins, security and safety updates on Play, Android XR, Media, Digicam, a ton of AndroidX updates, and far more.
Verify again quickly in your subsequent replace from the Android developer universe!