Android O and Android Nougat: What's changed?

Google’s latest update to Android has arrived in the form of an early developer preview, and as always, we’re excited. To no one’s surprise, the latest version of Android is called Android O (Oreo? Hopefully!) and it comes with quite a few changes. Developer preview is available only on Nexus and Pixel devices. So if you can’t get your hands on one yet and want to know about all the changes you can expect from Android O, we’re here to help. We’re pitting Android O against Android N. Here are the changes you should know about:

Android O and Android N: All changes

1. Notice

Google has been making changes to the way notifications work on Android since Marshmallow, and Android O is no exception. Android O seems to improve on all the great things Android Nougat brought to the table, and then some. In Android O, you get notification channels , which are basically categories that apps can categorize their notifications into. This means users have more control over the types of notifications they want instead of changing app-wide notification settings.

Android O also lets you snooze notifications , which seems like a really nice feature. Users can snooze a notification for a default time of 15 minutes by simply swiping the notification and tapping the snooze icon. This can be extended (at least in the current developer preview) up to 1 hour. Personally, I’d like to set some kind of custom time here, such as how “Inbox” handles email snooze, but since this is only an initial developer preview, the time for that is There are many.

There’s also a small change in how the notification shade works on Android O. On Android Nougat, double swiping the status bar to properly display the quick settings panel would hide some of the notifications at the bottom, but on Android O, those notifications are converted to smaller notifications. . Instead, you’ll see an app icon at the bottom of the notification shade. So while the quick settings panel is properly displayed, you can see apps with pending notifications without having to swipe up.

2. Quick settings

When it comes to quick settings, there are a few changes to how the quick settings panel works. In Android Nougat, tapping an icon like WiFi or Bluetooth opens expandable quick settings for that particular item , but in Android O this behavior is very different. Tap the icons for WiFi, Bluetooth, etc. to turn them on or off . However, tapping the text below any of these items will reveal the expandable quick settings for that item.

This is certainly a change that will take some getting used to, but it will ultimately save you a lot of tapping. If you just want to toggle on WiFi or Bluetooth like in Android Nougat, you have to tap the icon. Click to go to extensible quick settings and toggle WiFi. On Android O, you can simply tap the WiFi icon to turn it on or off.

3. Built-in file manager

Android has had a hidden but very rich built-in file manager for quite some time, previously accessible from the Storage screen in Settings, but now having its own icon in the app drawer . In Android Nougat, the app drawer only had a download icon, but in Android O this has been replaced with a file icon.

The option to go to “Downloads” within the Files app is still available, and the sorting options are much easier to see in the new app compared to Android Nougat’s hidden file manager. If you need files for basic file management, this file manager should work just fine. Android has so many options for a more powerful file manager.

4. Settings page

More than “significant changes in all previous Android versions,” the Settings page has been given a further overhaul, and it appears that Android Nougat’s slideover panels didn’t sit well with Google’s designers. From the Android O developer preview. Additionally, the settings page now chooses to actively categorize items into broader categories , resulting in a much shorter list of top settings lists.

The central monochrome theme here actually looks quite nice, and while the new configuration of options will certainly take some getting used to, I think it’s a good step towards a more organized settings screen. . If not, we’ll all use the search option anyway.

5. Picture in Picture

Picture-in-picture was first introduced in Android Nougat, but it was only available on Android TV, which has always been lacking due to the lack of use of Android TV (at least compared to the number of Android smartphones). Ta. Third Party Support for Features. Google is also bringing this feature to phones and tablets with Android O, which will hopefully allow developers to get on board with this feature as well.

I’d love to see more apps allow picture-in-picture mode so you can watch your favorite videos and browse Reddit at the same time.

6. Custom lock screen shortcuts

Be honest, how many times have you used these shortcuts on your lock screen? If you’re wondering what shortcuts I’m talking about, this proves my point. However, the reason most people didn’t use them in standard Android Nougat is because they performed functions that were more easily accessible in other ways. With Android O, Google gives users the ability to add custom apps to these shortcuts , making them really useful. You can now add things like “Get Directions Home” or “Compose a New Email” to your lock screen shortcuts, making frequently performed actions much easier.

7. Customizable navigation bar

Android O also allows users to customize the navigation bar. This was only possible with custom ROMs in previous versions of Android, such as Android Nougat. You’ll need to enable the System UI Tuner to do this, but it’s fairly easy to do. Android O gives users the option to add buttons, such as left and right arrows, to the navigation bar .

Android O also adds the ability to adjust the position of navigation bar buttons. Users can tilt the buttons to the left or right, or move them closer together in the middle of the navigation bar.

8. Ambient display

Android O also brings a number of changes to ambient display. In Android Nougat, the ambient display showed very detailed notifications, but with Android O, we’re opting for a cleaner , less battery-intensive ambient display. Notifications on the ambient display now appear as small icons arranged in a thin bar. The icons are almost too small, which obviously takes a lot of battery power, and it’s a bit difficult to tap (or double tap) on the narrow bar.

More exciting changes to ambient display include a richer way to display incoming notifications, with options like reply, archive (in Gmail), and more, depending on which notification actions your app supports. It has become. This is in contrast to Android Nougat, which displayed considerable detail in notifications but did not provide users with quick actions.

9. Adaptive icon

Another change Android O brings is one that perhaps hints at bigger and better things to come. Google announced support for adaptive icons in Android O. It’s not yet supported in apps in developer preview, but the description is vague but promising. From Google’s announcement: “Adaptive icons are icons that the system displays differently based on the mask selected by the device. The system also animates interactions with the icons and displays them in launchers, shortcuts, settings, Used in share dialogs and summary screens.

Essentially, any app that supports adaptive icons can adapt its icons to a user-selected theme, so if you’re using a theme with round icons, all icons on your device will be round. Displayed only as an icon. No disconnection. Announcements like this make it seem like themes may be integrated even deeper into the Android environment , helped by the “Device Themes” option available within the “Display” settings on Pixel devices. I am. Android O developer preview.

10. Installing apps from external sources

Android has always been generous about where users get their apps from. Unlike its competitors (iOS), Android allows users to install apps from anywhere as long as they enable the “Unknown Sources” option in their security settings. Android Nougat generally allows you to download apps from the internet, obtain APKs via Bluetooth, or install them using ES File Explorer, as long as you enable the setting to allow installation of apps from unknown sources. You can do that. However, in Android O, you must grant permissions to all sources individually.

This means a little more work, but it also ultimately prevents apps from installing other apps without permission, making your device a little more secure than it already is. So it doesn’t seem like a bad thing to do a little extra work to increase security.

11. Battery optimization

Android has always strived to improve the battery life it can squeeze out of its devices. Even as batteries get bigger and bigger, users still want more, and this can only be achieved when good hardware is used by highly optimized software. With Android O, Google aims to further improve the battery optimizations it made in Android Nougat.

The Doze feature, first introduced in Android Marshmallow and further improved in Android Nougat, has become more aggressive in Android O, placing more restrictions on what apps can run in the background and how often. do them. Android O imposes tighter restrictions on apps that request location updates, register for implicit broadcasts, or run background services . We can’t really tell what difference this makes, but since this is a developer preview, you can expect it to work exactly as Google says it will.

12. Changes to app behavior

Android O also brings changes to how apps work and the types of operations they can support. Now that Android apps are available on Chrome OS, Google announced support for a more reliable and predictable keyboard navigation model within apps. Also, unlike Android Nougat, apps on Android O can now use custom popup windows instead of the standard system alert box. While this is a potentially good feature, it can definitely be abused by poorly designed apps and can actually result in a bad UX. However, we hope that’s not the case, because custom popup boxes, if implemented properly, can make your app more attractive and fun to use than ever before.

13. Minor UI changes

Apart from these big changes, Android O also changes quite a few UI items compared to Android Nougat. For example, sliding the Pixel Launcher app drawer up darkens the navigation bar , which looks much better than it did on Android Nougat. Also, when it comes to the app drawer, you can now bring it up by sliding up anywhere on the home screen . This is definitely easier and much more intuitive.

Android O’s status bar is much more information-dense , and it makes up for this by employing a cleaner, lighter date and time font (which certainly looks nicer). Also, unlike Android Nougat, it is not possible to display the battery percentage within the battery icon itself . It only appears next to the battery icon. Another major difference with Android Nougat is that in Android 7 the battery icon was moved to the Quick Settings page, whereas in Android O the battery icon is kept in the status bar and you can only toggle ‘Battery Saver’ in Quick Settings. that you choose to display. This saves the user the hassle of tapping to enable that option, so I’m not really complaining.

The option to edit the quick settings panel is also available directly in the status bar itself, which makes it easier to customize the quick settings panel, but it also makes the status bar quite cluttered. Considering that customizing the Quick Settings panel isn’t something you do very often, this seems like a bit of an overkill.

14. Other changes in Android O

Other changes, or changes that regular users don’t really care about, and that developers probably care about, are also abundant in Android O. First, Android O brings support for the Autofill API . This allows your app to ask the user to register as the official (default) autofill app on the device, allowing it to automatically fill in information that the user enters frequently. Android O also announces support for a wider color gamut . This allows apps that work with photos and videos (usually editing applications) to take advantage of the increasingly impressive screens found on modern flagships and provide a better experience. user.

WebView also uses multi-process rendering by default . This was available as an option in Android Nougat, but by making it the default in Android O, Google is helping apps that use WebView load content faster and improve reliability by allowing them to handle crashes themselves. We aim to improve this even further. Apps can also use Google’s Safe Browsing verification , so users remain protected from malicious websites.

Android O also improves the Android runtime, making it up to 2x faster than Android Nougat . In addition to that, Android O brings Network Aware Networking to Android devices. This term basically means that Android devices can communicate with each other over a WiFi network even if the network is not connected to the internet.

See also: 8 cool features of Android O you need to know

Do you like the changes Android O brings?

This is just the first developer preview of Android O, and there are already many changes to Android Nougat. This means there may be more changes in future releases of Android O Preview, and this article will continue to be updated. With exciting new changes we are seeing. We’re certainly excited about some of the promise of Android O, such as adaptive icons and PiP mode for phones and tablets. what about you? Do you think Android O will be a nice upgrade over Android Nougat? Let us know in the comments section below.