Android 12 is the twelfth major release and 19th version of

Android Android most commonly refers to: *Android (robot), a humanoid robot or synthetic organism designed to imitate a human * Android (operating system), a mobile operating system primarily developed by Google * Android TV, a operating system developed ...

, the

mobile operating system A mobile operating system is an operating system used for smartphones, tablets, smartwatches, smartglasses, or other non-laptop personal mobile computing devices. While computers such as laptops are "mobile", the operating systems used on the ...

developed by the

Open Handset Alliance The Open Handset Alliance (OHA) is a consortium led by Google that develops the Android (operating system), Android mobile operating system. Its member firms included HTC, Sony, Dell, Intel, Motorola, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, Samsung Electr ...

led by

Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...

. The first beta was released on May 18, 2021. Android 12 was released publicly on October 4, 2021, through

Android Open Source Project Android is an operating system based on a modified version of the Linux kernel and other open-source software, designed primarily for touchscreen-based mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets. Android has historically been developed by ...

(AOSP) and was released to supported Google Pixel devices on October 19, 2021. , Android 12 is the 3rd most widely used version of Android, with 12.89% market share (slightly behind Android 13), with 682 million devices. The first phones to have Android 12 were the Google Pixel 6 and 6 Pro.

History

Android 12 (internally codenamed

Snow Cone A snow cone (or snow kone, sno kone, sno-kone, sno cone, or sno-cone) is a ground-up ice dessert commonly served in paper cones or foam cups. This is not to be confused with shaved ice which shaves a thin layer of ice off an ice block instea ...

) was announced in an Android blog posted on February 18, 2021. A developer preview was released immediately, with two additional ones planned the following two months. After that, four monthly beta releases were planned, beginning in May, the last one of them reaching platform stability in August, with general availability coming shortly after that. The second developer preview was released on March 17, 2021, followed by a third preview on April 21. The first beta build was then released on May 18, 2021. It was followed by beta 2 on June 9, which got a bug-fix update to 2.1 on June 23. The third beta was released on July 14, getting a bug-fix update to 3.1 on July 26. Beta 4 was released on August 11, 2021. A fifth beta, not planned in the original roadmap, was released on September 8, 2021. Android 12's stable version was released on the

on October 4 before getting its public over-the-air rollout on October 19, coinciding with the launch event for the

Pixel 6 The Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro are a pair of Android (operating system), Android phablet smartphones designed, developed, and marketed by Google as part of the Google Pixel product line. They collectively serve as the successor to the Pixel 5. T ...

Android 12.1/12L

In October 2021, Google announced Android 12L, an interim release of Android 12 including improvements specific for

foldable phone A foldable smartphone (also known as a foldable phone or simply foldable) is a smartphone with a folding form factor. While the foldable design has been incorporated before in clamshell (or "flip phone") phones, the current term "foldable" refe ...

s, tablets,

desktop A desktop traditionally refers to: * The surface of a desk (often to distinguish office appliances that fit on a desk, such as photocopiers and printers, from larger equipment covering its own area on the floor) Desktop may refer to various compu ...

-sized screens and

Chromebook Chromebook (sometimes stylized in lowercase as chromebook) is a line of laptops, desktops, tablets and all-in-one computers that run ChromeOS, a proprietary operating system developed by Google. Chromebooks are optimised for web access. They al ...

s, and modifications to the user interface to tailor it to larger screens. It was planned to launch in early 2022. Developer Preview 1 of Android 12L was released in October 2021, followed by Beta 1 in December 2021, Beta 2 in January 2022, and Beta 3 in February 2022. The stable version of Android 12L was released for devices with large screens on March 29, 2022, along with the redesigned Chrome logo & icon, It was released as "Android 12.1" for Pixel smartphones on the same date, besides the Pixel 6 & Pixel 6 Pro.

Features

User interface

Android 12 introduces a major refresh to the operating system's

Material Design Material Design (codename Quantum Paper) is a design language developed by Google in 2014. Expanding on the "cards" UI that debuted in Google Now, Material Design uses more grid-based layouts, responsive animations and transitions, padding, an ...

language branded as "

Material You Material Design (codename Quantum Paper) is a design language developed by Google in 2014. Expanding on the "cards" UI that debuted in Google Now, Material Design uses more grid-based layouts, responsive animations and transitions, padding, and ...

", which features larger buttons, increased use of animation, and a new style for home screen widgets. A feature, internally codenamed "monet", allows the operating system to automatically generate a wallpaper color theme (basic color theme for Android 12.1/12L) for system menus and supported apps using the colors of the user's wallpaper. The smart home and Wallet areas added to the power menu on Android 11 have been relocated to the notification shade, while Google Assistant is now activated by holding the power button. Android 12 features native support for taking scrolling screenshots. The

screen magnifier A screen magnifier is software that interfaces with a computer's graphical output to present enlarged screen content. By enlarging part (or all) of a screen, people with visual impairments can better see words and images. This type of assistive te ...

feature now allows partial magnification via a floating window, and can also be configured to follow text inputs. A

splash screen A splash screen is a graphical control element consisting of a window containing an image, a logo, and the current version of the software. A splash screen can appear while a game or program is launching. A splash page is an introduction page on a ...

is automatically generated for every installed app, which can be customised by app developers. The Core Splashscreen Jetpack library

backports Backporting is the action of taking parts from a newer version of a software system or software component and porting them to an older version of the same software. It forms part of the maintenance step in a software development process, and it is ...

this functionality for older Android versions. On Android 12.1/12L, the quick buttons were moved to a bottom–right corner of the screen. Also it brought many changes to the lock screen clock. It moved from left of the screen horizontally to the center of the screen stacked.

Platform

Performance improvements have been made to system services such as the window and package managers. The

Android Runtime Android Runtime (ART) is an application runtime environment used by the Android operating system. Replacing Dalvik, the process virtual machine originally used by Android, ART performs the translation of some of the application's bytecode i ...

has been added to Project Mainline, allowing it to be serviced via

Play Store Google Play, also known as the Google Play Store, Play Store, or sometimes the Android Store (and was formerly Android Market), is a digital distribution service operated and developed by Google. It serves as the official app store for certifie ...

. Android 12 adds support for

spatial audio 3D audio effects are a group of sound effects that manipulate the sound produced by stereo speakers, surround-sound speakers, speaker-arrays, or headphones. This frequently involves the virtual placement of sound sources anywhere in three-dimen ...

, and

MPEG-H 3D Audio MPEG-H 3D Audio, specified as ISO/ IEC 23008-3 ( MPEG-H Part 3), is an audio coding standard developed by the ISO/IEC Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) to support coding audio as audio channels, audio objects, or higher order ambisonics (HOA). ...

, and supports transcoding of

HEVC High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC), also known as H.265 and MPEG-H Part 2, is a video compression standard designed as part of the MPEG-H project as a successor to the widely used Advanced Video Coding (AVC, H.264, or MPEG-4 Part 10). In co ...

video for backwards compatibility with apps which do not support it. A new API known as HapticGenerator allows the OS to generate haptic feedback from audio on compatible devices. A "rich content insertion" API eases the ability to transfer formatted text and media between apps, such as via the

clipboard A clipboard is a thin, rigid writing board with a clip at the top for holding paper in place. A clipboard is typically used to support paper with one hand while writing on it with the other, especially when other writing surfaces are not avail ...

. Third-party app stores now have the ability to update apps without constantly asking the user for permission.

Privacy

OS-level

machine learning Machine learning (ML) is a field of study in artificial intelligence concerned with the development and study of Computational statistics, statistical algorithms that can learn from data and generalise to unseen data, and thus perform Task ( ...

functions are sandboxed within the "Android Private Compute Core", which is expressly prohibited from accessing networks. Apps requesting location data can now be restricted to having access only to "approximate" location data rather than "precise". Controls to prevent apps from using the camera and microphone system-wide have been added to the quick settings toggles. An indicator will also be displayed on-screen if they are active.

References

External links

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Video: 60+ changes in Android 12
{{Portal bar, Internet Android (operating system) versions 2021 software