Android 16 could overhaul notifications and Quick Settings

Android 16 Could Bring Major Changes to Notifications and Quick Settings

Google is reportedly working on a significant redesign of Android’s notification and Quick Settings panels for the upcoming Android 16 update. The new design is more compact, no longer occupying the entire screen. However, the revamped Quick Settings panel now requires a two-finger swipe to access, which might spark some controversy.

Recently, Google made the source code for Android 15 available to developers, allowing them to explore the latest platform features. However, not every feature Google worked on over the past year made it into the Android 15 release. Some of these features are likely to appear in future quarterly platform updates or in Android 16 next year. One of the most anticipated changes is a complete redesign of Android’s notification and Quick Settings panels.

The current layout of Android’s notification and Quick Settings panels was introduced with Android 12 in 2021, alongside Google’s Material You design language. In this setup, the notification and Quick Settings panels are unified: pulling down the status bar once reveals the first four Quick Settings tiles and the entire notifications panel, while a second pull-down shows the full Quick Settings panel alongside a few notifications. This has been the standard approach for stock Android, as seen in AOSP, for years.

However, this unified design isn’t universal across all Android versions. Some Android forks, like Xiaomi’s HyperOS, separate the notifications and Quick Settings panels—a design choice that many of Xiaomi’s users prefer. Separating these panels allows for more notifications and Quick Settings tiles to be displayed, although not everyone agrees with this approach. Rumors of Samsung and OPPO adopting this design sparked significant online debate. Now, it seems Google is also exploring a similar dual-shade design for Android 16.

While experimenting with the latest Android 15 QPR beta, I managed to activate a new version of the notification and Quick Settings panels, which I believe is intended for Android 16. In this new design, pulling down the status bar once still brings down the notifications panel, but it now only covers about a quarter of the screen. Unlike before, the Quick Settings tiles are no longer visible in this dropdown, allowing users to see the app underneath the panel.

To access the Quick Settings panel, users must now swipe down with two fingers—a change that might not sit well with everyone due to the extra effort required. Once the Quick Settings panel is open, users can swipe left or right between pages to view all their tiles. The brightness bar remains at the top, now featuring a text label and displaying the brightness level as it’s adjusted, similar to the new volume sliders introduced in Android 15. The tiles themselves are smaller, allowing more to fit on each page.

Here’s a video demonstrating the new notification and Quick Settings panels that Google appears to be developing for Android 16:

As you can see, the design is still in its early stages. Several features, such as the user switcher, power menu, and icons for many tiles, are currently missing. Additionally, the panels do not handle light mode well, with white text being nearly invisible. Support for light mode would be a welcome addition since the current design lacks it entirely.

You may also notice the red banner labeled “flexi🥛” in the bottom right corner of the screenshots. This refers to “Flexiglass,” the internal codename for Google’s efforts to rearchitect SystemUI for greater stability. By applying the principle of separation of concerns, Google aims to turn each main component of SystemUI into standalone experiences called “scenes.”

While it’s uncertain whether Google will stick with this particular design, it’s clear that the company is working on a substantial overhaul of the notification and Quick Settings panels. I sincerely hope they reconsider the two-finger swipe requirement for accessing Quick Settings, as it could become a source of frustration.