Recognition: Jimmy Westenberg / Android Authority
- An unreleased build of Android 12 highlighted a lot of new features and improvements.
- Expect new emojis, new permissions, the ability to trigger the assistant from the power button, and much more.
- There is no guarantee that all of these features and optimizations will be available in the final version.
The Android 12 developer preview program is already well underway, allowing users to install early versions of the upcoming Android update on supported phones. These early updates already give us a good idea of what’s coming next, such as: B. Easier Wi-Fi sharing, one-handed mode, and better notifications.
Now, XDA developer got access to an unreleased version of the Android 12 Developer Preview which gives us a look at some potentially upcoming features. For one, you can use Google to trigger the assistant by holding down the power button for a few seconds. You will probably have to hold the button down for a few seconds to access the actual energy menu.
Other notable additions include new emojis based on the Unicode Emoji 13.1 version, tiles for quick settings for smart home controls and cards / badges, notifications when apps access your clipboard, and two new permissions.
The new permissions are mysterious “Media Management” and “Alarms and Reminders” permissions. The point of sale explains that the latter permission allows an app to schedule alarms and reminders, so third-party alarm / reminder apps may need to take this change into account in the future.
Android 12: What Else Was Uncovered?
There are tons of general improvements in this unreleased version of Android 12 as well. More notable improvements include improved scrolling screenshots (launching a separate window with an expanded screenshot from the start so you can crop as you want), a search box in the widget picker so you can find the widget in question. and automatic splash screens for apps when they open.
In the latter case XDA This Android 12 build was found to have generated an automatic splash screen for the outlet’s own app, even though there was already a splash screen (so that it ended up with two splash screens). We expect buggy behavior like this given the early nature of the Android 12 update, but hopefully Google is working hard to fix this issue.
There are many other improvements, such as: For example, new charging animations, the use of new Wi-Fi standard names (e.g. Wi-Fi 5, Wi-Fi 6) and dual-panel homescreen views for tablets. The complete overview with screenshots and videos can be found in the XDA Items.
It should be emphasized that the presence of code pointing out new features and tweaks does not necessarily mean that these will be available in the final Android 12 update. After all, we’ve seen code for features like dark mode and desktop mode in previous versions of Android long before they actually ended up in the final update.