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Android Developers Blog

The Android Developers blog is a platform maintained by Google to provide updates, insights, and guides for Android app developers. It publishes regular posts on various topics, including new features in Android, updates to the Android developer tools, developer success stories, and tips on developer best practices. The blog is targeted towards developers working on Android apps and aims to help them optimize their apps for the Android platform. It also encourages developers to share their experiences, ideas, and achievements in app development.
Android Developers Blog android-developers.googleblog.com
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RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 19, 2024

Thread Of Notes

Android Developers Blog is moving

Posted by the Android Developers TeamToday, we are closing this chapter on Blogger and moving all official news and engineering insights directly to developer.android.com/blog. The new blog will have improved formatting, tighter integration with our technical content and be easier to navigate. Update your bookmarks and RSS today. Happy Coding!
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/10/android-developers-blog-is-moving.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Oct 15

New ways to drive smarter discovery, deeper engagement, and business growth on Google Play

Google Play is enhancing its platform to better connect users with apps and help developers build sustainable businesses. New discovery features like "Ask Play" now offer app comparisons within search results, while "Game finder" provides personalized game recommendations. Apps are also being discovered directly through conversations within the Gemini app, driving significant installs. Developers are advised to keep store listings updated, use high-quality media, validate deep links, and integrate the Engage SDK.To deepen player engagement, Google Play is introducing social competitions and rewards. "Playbacks" in Sidekick bring features like Quests and Sprints to users, while "Sprints" offer short, skill-based challenges. "Quests" are being expanded to include in-game rewards beyond Play Points. Integrating "Game Stats" and "Play Games Rewards" enables these social and competitive mechanics.Google Play's quality programs, "Apps Experience" and "Level Up," reward top apps and games with reduced service fees. These programs encourage developers to improve graphics, integrate key features, and launch new engagement tools. Successful integration has led to significant increases in installs and player spending for participating titles. These programs are expanding globally, with enrollment now streamlined within Play Console.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/10/new-tools-for-discovery-and-engagement.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Oct 13

Bringing our latest frontier model to Android Developers

Android engineering is advancing into agentic development, enabling agents to execute end-to-end tasks under developer direction. Gemini 4 Argon is now available to Android developers, excelling in complex real-world tasks across various domains. Developers can access Argon through Google Antigravity and Android Studio Canary for Google AI Ultra subscribers, or via the Gemini API's paid tier in Android Studio and Google AI Studio. Argon features improved autonomous execution for long-horizon, multi-step software tasks. It also introduces self-healing build loops that diagnose and fix build failures using error logs. The model demonstrates sophisticated UI development, generating production-ready Jetpack Compose code and AGSL shaders for advanced graphics. A flexible developer experience is provided through the Android CLI plugin, connecting agents to local Android tools. Access to Argon can be set up visually in the Antigravity Desktop App or Android Studio Canary. Alternatively, users can configure it via the terminal CLI by installing the android-cli-plugin. Argon is rolling out globally, with access points including Google Antigravity, Android Studio, and Google AI Studio. Firebase AI Logic also supports Argon for building intelligent features in mobile and web applications. Developers need a Google AI Ultra subscription or to be on the paid Gemini API tier to start building with Argon.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/10/bringing-gemini-4-argon-to-android-agentic-engineering-antigravity-cli.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Oct 13

New ways to drive smarter discovery, deeper engagement, and business growth on Google Play

Today, we shared how we’re taking our “more than a store” vision into its next chapter. From You tab, now the personal home base for over 250M monthly active users, to our unified gaming platform connecting over 700M gamer profiles, Google Play is meeting users wherever they are.
https://developer.android.com/blog/posts/google-play-discovery-engagement-growth developer.android.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Oct 13

Introducing the Googlebook Linux Terminal Preview: A VM-Backed Environment for AI and Development

Google is introducing a Linux terminal on Googlebooks, designed to empower users with access to AI workflows, regardless of their technical expertise. This new feature comes pre-installed with essential tooling to facilitate immediate use. The terminal serves as an entry point for agentic development, allowing AI agents to perform tasks like installing software, writing files, and automating processes based on natural language prompts.Security is a core principle, with the terminal operating within an isolated Linux virtual machine (VM) sandbox, protecting the host operating system and user files. Users can grant administrator privileges to AI tools safely, as all operations are contained within the VM. Explicit user permission is required to mount directories, and a one-click VM reset allows for stress-free experimentation while preserving user files. Linux files are accessible through the Googlebook Files app, integrating seamlessly with synced Android phone content.The Debian Linux environment offers a mature ecosystem with access to standard developer tools such as apt, git, and ssh. The terminal is optimized for rapid prototyping, web development, scripting, and agentic workflows, featuring automatic localhost port forwarding and support for popular runtimes like Node.js and Python. Users can also adjust VM memory for optimal performance.Future plans include Linux GUI app support integrated into the app launcher, enabling users to run graphical Linux applications directly on Googlebooks. The roadmap also features USB passthrough for local device debugging, dynamic memory and storage scaling for more complex tasks, and GPU/NPU hardware acceleration for demanding workloads. VM persistence and separation from the terminal window are also planned to better support long-running agentic processes. Google encourages user feedback and collaboration in shaping this evolving ecosystem.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/10/googlebook-linux-terminal-preview-vm.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Oct 12

Device Streaming and Android skills - available in Android CLI

Android developers now have enhanced command-line tools to improve their workflow. The Android CLI facilitates the creation, building, testing, and management of Android projects. A significant new feature is the integration of Android Device Streaming, allowing agents to access real physical devices remotely. This capability enables developers to test hardware and OS-specific issues without needing direct physical access. Agents can interact with these remote devices securely, performing tasks like deploying builds and capturing logs. To further assist developers, Google is expanding its Android skills repository. These skills provide structured instructions that ground AI agents with official guidance and up-to-date information. With over 20 skills available, agents can now handle complex tasks like auditing Play policy compliance and implementing credential restoration. A particular spotlight is on the Wear OS Compose Material 3 skill, which helps agents navigate the unique design patterns of Wear OS development. Early adopters have reported substantial productivity gains from utilizing these skills.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/10/android-cli-device-streaming-and-skills.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Oct 2

How Instagram Direct engineers built AI-native UI architecture with Jetpack Compose and reduced token cost per agent session by 33%

The Instagram Direct team undertook a significant modernization of their Android UI by adopting Jetpack Compose. This migration went beyond a simple UI rewrite; they aimed to build an AI-native codebase from the ground up. The primary motivation was to address technical debt and engineering overhead associated with a highly optimized legacy View system. Jetpack Compose's declarative nature was chosen to make the UI code more predictable and easier for AI models to understand.A gradual migration strategy was crucial due to the massive scale of Instagram Direct, handling billions of messages daily. Embedding Compose within the existing View hierarchy was considered an interim step, but a full transition was preferred to avoid subtle bugs and performance issues caused by mixing UI paradigms. The team focused on creating clear architectural boundaries to enhance AI's ability to produce high-quality code.By adhering to AI-friendly principles, such as minimizing custom context dependencies and enforcing architectural boundaries, the team ensured better AI results. They developed a structured migration process that involved writing all Compose code with AI assistance, followed by polishing and testing. This approach allowed for rapid development without disrupting ongoing feature releases.The results demonstrated substantial improvements: the UI code was reduced by 50%, engineer-agent exchanges decreased by 32%, and AI execution time dropped by 35%. Token costs for AI tasks also saw a 33% reduction when using Compose compared to Views. The new Compose-based UI showed greater resilience to code risk compared to the legacy View system. This collaborative effort between Meta and Google not only modernized Instagram Direct but also contributed to the broader Android developer ecosystem by optimizing Compose itself. The team successfully met and even exceeded the high-performance bar of the legacy UI, ensuring a seamless user experience.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/09/jetpack-compose-ai-native-ui-instagram-direct.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 30

Driving growth on Google Play: The next era of subscriptions

The subscription landscape is rapidly evolving, driven by generative AI and sophisticated app experiences, necessitating more flexible monetization tools for developers. Google Play is expanding its subscription platform to support growth, new business models, and user engagement. New capabilities include Multi-Quantity Subscriptions, enabling team-wide access for productivity and education. Usage-Based Billing supports apps with variable computing costs, like AI tools, through prepaid metered billing. Mixed Carts allow combined purchases of subscriptions and one-time products, streamlining checkout and creating upsell opportunities. Cross-Developer Bundling facilitates partnerships, letting developers sell complementary subscriptions together for wider reach. To maximize performance, the In-App Messaging API helps resolve payment declines and communicate price changes. Dynamic Grace Period uses machine learning to tailor payment recovery windows, balancing user needs with service costs. Retention Offers and Plan Changes within the cancellation flow prevent voluntary churn by providing incentives or tier adjustments. Native Winback Offers re-engage lapsed subscribers directly on the Play Store with personalized offers. Google Play also offers behind-the-scenes optimizations, like smart payment retries and fraud prevention, to protect developer revenue.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/09/unlocking-Google-play-subscription-growth.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 29

Build intelligent Android apps: In-app agentic workflows

This article details building intelligent Android apps by creating autonomous, agentic workflows in the cloud. For complex tasks exceeding a single device session, a self-hosted backend executes agents in the background, preserving progress and simplifying credential management. Cloud-hosted agents offer advantages like uninterrupted background execution, sophisticated multi-agent orchestration, and adaptable client UIs. The Jetpacker app's Booking Assistant exemplifies this, coordinating various reservations using the Agent Development Kit (ADK).ADK enables defining agents with Python function tools for database interaction and bookings, streamlining orchestration. The Android app sends itinerary data, the coordinator agent triggers subagents, and results stream back via a session queue. Communication between agents and the Android app is standardized by the AG-UI protocol, handling lifecycle events and message types. A2UI further enhances this by allowing agents to dynamically describe UI components.This dynamic UI rendering avoids app updates for layout changes. The backend sends JSON payloads describing components, which the client interprets. The ADK A2UI integration compiles component schemas into system prompts, guiding the LLM to generate valid A2UI payloads. On Android, the Jetpack Compose A2UI Renderer library natively renders these components based on registered catalog definitions. The booking assistant's specific components are implemented, and the A2uiMessageProcessor handles A2UI messages.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/09/android-agentic-workflows.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 28

Build your way: Use any AI agent of your choice in Android Studio

AI-powered developer tools are enhancing engineering productivity, and Android development is becoming more flexible with agentic approaches. Android Studio now supports various AI models and introduces "Bring Your Own Agent" (BYOA) for preferred coding agents. This feature integrates agents like Anthropic’s Claude, OpenAI’s Codex, and Google’s Antigravity into Android Studio’s AI-optimized infrastructure. BYOA, available in the latest Android Studio Canary, offers codebase awareness, token efficiency, and seamless workflow continuity. It also provides agent flexibility, allowing users to switch agents and inject native tools for testing and execution. These powerful agents can plan and execute technical workflows, including reading/writing files, running commands, and delegating tasks to subagents. They also benefit from Android skills and the Android Knowledge Base for best practices. For Gemini users, selecting the Google Antigravity agent is recommended for access to the latest Gemini models and increased quota. BYOA supports both enterprise and consumer AI plans and is rolling out in preview with Android Studio Rabbit 2. Users can connect agents by updating Android Studio, signing in with their chosen agent, and exploring the documentation. Feedback is crucial for refining the AI experience in Android Studio.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/09/build-your-way-use-any-ai-agent-in-android-studio.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 24

Land your apps on Googlebook with adaptive development

Googlebook introduces a new category of laptops powered by Android, offering high-performance hardware with mobile convenience and desktop power. These devices feature OLED touchscreens, dedicated keyboards, precision trackpads, all-day battery life, and OS-level Gemini Intelligence. Developers can optimize their Android apps for Googlebook by embracing adaptive development, which naturally scales applications across large displays and new device form factors. This involves utilizing adaptive layouts, multi-pane architectures, and responding to window size classes for optimal user experiences. Desktop design principles, including higher information density and precision input, should be considered when adapting mobile interfaces. Jetpack Compose natively supports keyboard and pointer navigation, allowing for enhanced usability with contextual cursors and right-click menus. Multi-instance support and drag-and-drop functionality enable multitasking and fluid data transfer between windows. Developers can also customize window frames and leverage "Continue On" to seamlessly transition tasks between devices. Tools like the desktop emulator in Android Studio and AI-assisted development can accelerate the testing and optimization process for Googlebook. By building adaptively, a single codebase ensures optimal performance and unlocks elevated visibility on Google Play for apps across the Android ecosystem.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/09/adaptive-development-scale-app-googlebook.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 22

Bring your Android game to the car screen today

The games category for Android Auto and Android Automotive OS has moved from beta to general availability. Developers can now publish games to these platforms, reaching users during natural downtime in their vehicles. To adapt an existing Android game, developers need to configure their app manifest and ensure the game respects the vehicle's parked state. The manifest must declare the app as a game using the android:appCategory="game" attribute.Support for Android Auto is declared by including the android.intent.category.CAR_LAUNCHER category element in an activity's intent filter. For Android Automotive OS, the android.hardware.automotive element must be included in the manifest. Games are considered parked apps and cannot run while the vehicle is in motion to prevent driver distraction. Developers should ensure their game audio stops when the user starts driving and does not unpause while the vehicle is in motion.Additionally, games must restore their state when relaunched after UX restrictions are active and be responsive without freezing or stuttering. Declaring controller support via the android.hardware.gamepad feature can boost app visibility for users seeking controller-compatible games. Games should also be adaptive to various car screen sizes and aspect ratios, running full screen without letterboxing or pillarboxing.Before submitting to production, developers must opt in to Android Auto and Android Automotive OS form factors in the Google Play Console and test their games against car app quality guidelines. The Desktop Head Unit and Android Automotive OS emulator are available for thorough testing. Games will be reviewed against the car app quality guidelines for the games category before approval.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/09/bring-android-game-to-car-screen.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 21

Introducing the AndroidX Security State Libraries: A Unified View of Device Security

Android is releasing new libraries to improve device security transparency. The AndroidX Security State version 1.1.0 and Security State Provider version 1.0.0 libraries offer a centralized way to understand device security postures and pending updates. These tools allow developers to verify security at a component level, moving beyond the old single Security Patch Level. The libraries introduce three new patch levels: Device SPL (DSPL) for the installed level, Published SPL (PSPL) for the latest bulletin level, and Available SPL (ASPL) for ready downloads. These levels are tracked for the system, system modules, and the kernel. This granular data enables developers and enterprises to make informed security decisions based on actual protection and pending updates. For instance, banking apps can check ASPL before high-value transactions and prompt users to update if needed. The Security State Provider library standardizes how update clients report availability, making ASPL accessible via a unified API. This integration with the Open Source Vulnerabilities database provides a more accurate "effective" security state. Additionally, OEMs can now declare supplemental patch information to receive immediate credit for backported fixes. Developers can explore guides and documentation to begin using these new security libraries. Feedback on the libraries can be provided through the Android Issue Tracker.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/09/introducing-androidx-security-state-libraries.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 17

Android Bench 2.0: Pushing the frontier with challenging long-horizon tasks

Today we’re releasing the first set of long-horizon tasks (LHT), which are tasks of great complexity that take an engineer multiple days or even a week to complete. We are also introducing agentic evaluation, starting with agents from corresponding model providers.
https://developer.android.com/blog/posts/android-bench-2-0-pushing-the-frontier-with-challenging-long-horizon-tasks developer.android.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 17

Android Bench 2.0: Pushing the frontier with challenging long-horizon tasks

Android Bench has been updated to version 2.0, introducing long-horizon tasks (LHTs) that mirror complex, multi-day engineering challenges. This upgrade also includes agentic evaluation, starting with agents from corresponding model providers. The previous benchmark focused on simpler, incremental code changes, but the new LHTs include tasks like app dependency upgrades, feature additions, and building apps from scratch. Traditional binary scoring is being replaced with continuous scoring to better reflect the nuanced progress made on these complex tasks. This new scoring method considers functionality, visual fidelity, and avoids regressions, with penalties for instruction deviations. Currently, the highest pass rate for LHTs is around 28%, a significant drop from the prior benchmark's success rate. AI models demonstrate strength in writing new code over refactoring existing code, excelling at established deterministic transformations. However, they struggle with tasks requiring runtime validation, breaking framework changes, or knowledge gaps in unreleased libraries. Porting cross-platform apps to Android remains a particularly challenging area for AI. The evaluation now incorporates commonly used agents to assess performance in agentic workflows. New models like Gemini 3.8 Flash and OpenAI’s GPT-6 have been added to the leaderboard. Android Bench 2.0 aims to provide transparency and empower developers by offering a more robust environment for evaluating AI for Android development. Feedback on the updated methodology and leaderboard is encouraged for future improvements.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/09/android-bench-2-long-horizon-tasks.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 16

Introducing Fast and Reliable Wireless Debugging with Android Debug Bridge (ADB) Wi-Fi 2.0

Android Studio has significantly improved wireless debugging with the introduction of ADB Wi-Fi 2.0. This update addresses developer feedback by enhancing speed, reliability, and ease of setup. The core components, including the adb server, adbd daemon, and Android Studio, have been re-engineered. A new mDNS stack replaces previous implementations, ensuring more stable connections even with network changes or device power cycles. The adbd daemon now automatically disables ADB Wi-Fi on untrusted networks for enhanced security. Android Studio’s Device Manager now offers improved discoverability for Wi-Fi pairing. These improvements have led to a 32% increase in auto-connection success and a 66% boost in connection speed for most connections. ADB Wi-Fi 2.0 is available on phones, tablets, Wear OS, and TVs. Users need to update their Android version, SDK Platform-Tools, and Android Studio to utilize the new features. Getting started involves enabling wireless debugging on the device and then pairing through Android Studio’s Device Manager.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/09/wireless-debugging-adb-wifi-2.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 9

Introducing Fast and Reliable Wireless Debugging with Android Debug Bridge (ADB) Wi-Fi 2.0

Wireless debugging on Android is now faster, more reliable, and easier to set up than ever. With ADB Wi-Fi 2.0, we’ve introduced a new server stack and smarter network handling to directly address developer feedback around usability gaps.
https://developer.android.com/blog/posts/introducing-fast-and-reliable-wireless-debugging-with-android-debug-bridge-adb-wi-fi-2-0 developer.android.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 9

Leverage Android skills and Gemma 4 in Android Studio Quail 4

Android Studio Quail 4 is now a stable release, offering enhanced AI capabilities for app development. The IDE now bundles curated "Android skills" for AI models, ensuring accurate and up-to-date code assistance for Android-specific tasks. These skills guide large language models through complex workflows, leveraging Google's best practices. Twenty-three pre-loaded skills cover areas like build upgrades, profiling, and UI adaptation. Developers can also create custom skills for specialized team workflows or use them with external command-line tools. Android Studio Quail 4 also integrates Gemma 4, Google's powerful open model, for private, secure, and offline AI coding assistance. This integration requires significant RAM but allows for multi-file refactoring without code leaving the local machine or hitting token limits. User interface enhancements in Quail 4 improve AI interactions with hyperlinked code symbols and real-time notifications for parallel agent tasks. A unified Summary of Changes tab consolidates multi-step task outcomes for easier review. For more advanced AI usage, developers can upgrade their Gemini access through API keys, Google AI plans, or Gemini Enterprise. The Quail series has progressively introduced features like App Quality Insights integration, agentic multitasking, local model support, and simplified planning modes. Android Studio Quail 4 provides users with a more efficient and intelligent development experience, encouraging users to download and provide feedback.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/09/leverage-gemma-4-android-studio-quail.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Sep 1

Emulator control for adaptive app development

Adaptive app development on Android requires thorough testing across various devices and screen configurations. While Android Studio offers a resizable emulator for manual layout checks, a more efficient method exists using terminal commands. The adb emu command allows developers to control emulator form factors directly from the command line, returning control to the shell immediately after execution. This shortcut is particularly useful for testing foldable devices, enabling programmatic folding and unfolding to simulate different screen states. Developers can test foldable-specific user journeys and layout behavior by toggling between folded and unfolded states. Furthermore, the adb emu rotate command facilitates the testing of orientation changes and state restoration within apps. For simulating physical postures like tabletop mode, developers can query available postures using adb emu posture and then set a specific posture. The resizable emulator can also be controlled via the terminal, with presets for different sizes available through adb emu resize-display. These commands streamline the testing process, saving significant time and resources compared to managing multiple emulators. Developers are encouraged to explore these console shortcuts to improve their adaptive app development workflow.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/emulator-adaptive.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 31

How WhatsApp Upgraded to Secure, Seamless Sign-In for 1 Billion Users with Passkeys

WhatsApp, the world's largest messaging platform, adopted passkeys in 2023, enhancing user security and convenience. This initiative aimed to provide a fast, phishing-resistant authentication method that reduces user friction and protects against account takeovers. Mayank Manuja, an Android Engineer on the WhatsApp Registration and Access team, led this design and implementation. Building for billions of users required navigating diverse network conditions, device capabilities, and digital literacy levels. Passkeys offer a streamlined, one-tap login experience, leveraging public-private key cryptography with biometric or screen lock authentication. This significantly improves sign-in speeds and functions reliably even where traditional SMS OTP delivery is inconsistent.From a developer perspective, the Credential Manager API provided a unified interface, simplifying integration despite numerous edge cases across Android versions and device configurations. WhatsApp and Google collaborated to optimize credential lookup flow, improving latency for new passkey users. They also built a comprehensive error-handling layer to manage device-specific hurdles and ensure graceful degradation when passkey flows couldn't complete. Furthermore, they tackled OS-specific exceptions, implementing platform-level improvements for smoother passkey creation flows.WhatsApp refined the user experience through extensive A/B testing, developing a contextual framework for prompting passkey creation. On the backend, WhatsApp's server implements standard WebAuthn/FIDO2 ceremonies using Erlang and a Rust webauthn-rs library for signature verification. The server architecture orchestrates passkey registration by generating options for the client, verifying attestation, and securely persisting credentials. For authentication, it fetches valid credentials, generates a server-side challenge, and verifies the client's assertion.Advanced architectural considerations included migrating to a multi-passkey per account system, which required engineering a bounded list system to evict older credentials once a limit was reached. This significant structural shift was rolled out gradually through rigorous experimentation to ensure stability. Balancing the credential lifecycle also required careful management of credential validity.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/whatsapp-passkeys-secure-sign-in.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 27

Elevating app quality: Reducing memory usage and improving device migration

Google Play is introducing new quality requirements to enhance the Android ecosystem for both developers and users. These changes focus on reducing app memory footprint and simplifying secure device migration. New performance thresholds are being established to address hardware constraints and Android's memory limits. These thresholds will cover dynamic memory usage, bitmap memory usage, and code optimization. Developers will have access to new tools within Play Console to identify and resolve memory bloat issues. These tools include memory metrics in Android vitals, crash filters, and DEX code optimization insights. Proactive performance alerts will also be provided when apps exceed new bad behavior thresholds. Enforcement for these memory-related requirements will begin in February 2027. Apps failing to meet these thresholds may experience reduced visibility and publishing capabilities.Additionally, Google Play is introducing a new onboarding standard for secure and seamless device migration. This standard requires apps supporting user sign-in to implement Zero-Tap Sign-In using the Android Restore Credentials API. This feature will automatically restore a user's sign-in state when they switch to a new Android device. The Zero-Tap Sign-In requirement will also take effect in April 2027. While games are currently exempt, guidance for their authentication is expected in 2027. Meeting these upcoming quality requirements is crucial for maintaining optimal visibility and publishing capabilities on Google Play.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/app-quality-memory-optimization-secure-onboarding.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 26

Ensuring Safety in the Generative AI Ecosystem: Protecting Users from Non-Consensual Intimate Content

Google Play emphasizes that user safety and developer success are intertwined. The platform is seeing growth in apps incorporating AI-generated features, which offer creative possibilities. However, these AI advancements also introduce new safety challenges, particularly the creation and distribution of non-consensual intimate imagery (NCII). Google Play strictly prohibits such content and is committed to removing harmful applications. The company is investing heavily in platform protections, technical defenses, and developer resources to combat abuse. Safeguarding the ecosystem involves multi-layered defenses across the app lifecycle, continuous testing for robust controls, and cutting off monetization pathways for bad actors. Google Play also collaborates with third-party organizations and AI safety research groups to identify and address NCII abuse. Developers are encouraged to streamline app reviews by providing clear visibility into their AI features and safety guardrails. Building apps for safety includes stress-testing against adversarial prompts and integrating customized input/output moderation controls. Developers are reminded of their accountability for app advertisements and are urged to leverage user interactions as signals for continuous improvement and safety. Responsible AI innovation, coupled with safety and user trust, is a key focus for Google Play's ongoing support of developers.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/ensuring-safety-genai-preventing-non-consensual-intimate-content.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 25

Ensuring Safety in the Generative AI Ecosystem: Protecting Users from Non-Consensual Intimate Content

At Google Play, user safety and developer success go hand in hand. We continue to see growth in apps with AI generated features, and indeed, adding generative AI into your apps is a great way to unlock incredible creative possibilities.
https://developer.android.com/blog/posts/ensuring-safety-in-the-generative-ai-ecosystem-protecting-users-from-non-consensual-intimate-content developer.android.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 25

AAOS SDV - Secure by Design

Android Automotive Operating System for Software Defined Vehicle leverages virtualization for domain isolation, running multiple logical domains like cluster and infotainment systems in parallel virtual machines. It inherits Android's robust security features, including user ID-based process isolation and a deny-by-default posture enforced by SELinux. AAOS SDV integrates Android's mature vulnerability management infrastructure for identifying, remediating, and disclosing security findings through automated scanning and penetration testing. Software integrity is ensured through authenticated software delivery, utilizing read-only partitions and APEX packages with mandatory signature validation. APEX packages enhance security through immutable storage, cryptographic integrity via dm-verity, strict process isolation, and atomic recovery mechanisms for updates. For platform resilience, AAOS SDV prioritizes memory-safe development, primarily using Rust for new components. It establishes distributed trust with a mesh provisioning architecture that cryptographically verifies communication endpoints, binding network identity to execution state. DICE-based authentication and attestation are used for hardware-grounded identity verification and integrity checks, particularly for securing VM-to-VM communication via TLS. Layered access control, consisting of service-level and VM-level permissions, allows OEMs to balance security with updatability for dynamic vehicle updates. Overall, AAOS SDV offers a secure-by-design approach for software-defined vehicles through multi-layered defenses and hardware-rooted verification.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/aaos-sdv-secure-by-design.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 24

Preparing your app for broader memory limits

Android is prioritizing a great user experience by focusing on fast, responsive, and reliable devices. Memory optimization is crucial as devices often have limited physical memory while users expect high performance. Android 17 introduced per-app memory limits, initially on Pixel devices, to prevent apps from causing system-wide slowdowns. This feature will expand to a wider range of devices and RAM configurations from various manufacturers. Apps exceeding their memory limits will be throttled and may be terminated by the system. Understanding how these limits work, including zRAM swapping and process termination, is essential for developers. Developers can identify if their app was impacted by memory limits through specific exit reasons in ApplicationExitInfo. Monitoring memory usage is vital for optimization, and Android Vitals in Google Play Console offers macro-level visibility into memory distribution. Firebase Crashlytics helps track Out-Of-Memory exceptions and memory limiter kills with additional debug data. The ProfilingManager API allows for in-field collection of detailed memory debug artifacts from production devices. Developers are urged to audit their app's memory footprint and implement optimization best practices to avoid performance issues. Prioritizing memory optimization and continuous monitoring are key steps for maintaining a seamless user experience.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/app-broader-memory-limits.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 19

Tinder cuts app cold starts by 47% with new R8 Configuration Analyzer

Tinder's large Android app codebase faced significant optimization challenges, with approximately 70% unoptimized and numerous dex files. Keep rules, enabled by R8, were inadvertently blocking optimization without clear identification of offenders. To address slow startup times and perceived ANR errors, Tinder adopted the R8 Configuration Analyzer. This tool helped them pinpoint and remove unintentional optimization blockers, leading to immediate improvements. Specifically, Tinder reduced app cold starts by 47%, decreased download size by nearly 29%, and lowered user-perceived ANRs by 28%. The Configuration Analyzer identifies areas for refinement by tracking shrinking, optimization, and obfuscation scores. It reveals broad, redundant, or obsolete keep rules, including those from external libraries. Tinder discovered a particularly wide, unscoped keep rule in an in-house library was preventing significant optimization. Refining this rule unlocked substantial performance gains, increasing R8 scores from 28% to 50%. These improvements reduced DEX files, which positively impacted user engagement, especially on resource-constrained devices. Tinder has since integrated optimization monitoring into their CI/CD pipeline to prevent future regressions.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/tinder-app-cold-start-r8-configuration-analyzer.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 18

Jetpack XR SDK core libraries reach beta: The next milestone for Android XR

The Android XR SDK has introduced beta versions of Jetpack SceneCore, ARCore for Jetpack XR, and XR Runtime, signaling API stabilization for production. Jetpack Compose for XR will also be released soon. These tools empower developers to create immersive and augmented reality experiences for Android XR devices using familiar Android development practices. Jetpack SceneCore assists in building and managing 3D scene graphs with entity-component systems. ARCore for Jetpack XR enables digital content integration with the real world through perception capabilities like depth estimation and hit testing. The XR Runtime provides the foundational elements for device lifecycles and session management. Jetpack Compose for XR will allow for the creation of spatial user interfaces using Compose concepts. Recent beta updates include expanded testing support for spatial audio and XR devices, Kotlin coroutine alignment, and updated terminology for more consistent spatial management. Developers can integrate these beta libraries into their projects by adding the Google Maven repository and the specified dependencies to their Gradle files. With the growing Android XR ecosystem, now is an opportune moment to begin developing immersive experiences.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/jetpack-xr-sdk-core-libraries-beta.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 18

Enhance your app for the new Pixel lineup: Unveiled at Made by Google

Google's latest Pixel devices, including the Pixel Fold and Pixel Watch, offer developers significant opportunities to enhance user experiences across diverse form factors. Foldable phones, in particular, present a chance for apps to adapt to larger, dynamic screen real estate. Developers can leverage Jetpack Compose APIs and Window Size Classes to create responsive layouts that intelligently reflow content around folds and hinges. State preservation with ViewModel ensures seamless transitions between folded and unfolded states, as demonstrated by Notability and Flo Health.For wearables, Wear OS 7 on the Pixel Watch 5 introduces one-handed gesture control and Live Updates to provide efficient, glanceable interactions. Spotify is already integrating gesture control for media playback, while Just Eat uses Live Updates for real-time order tracking. Wear Widgets offer expressiveness and consistency across watch surfaces. Gemini Nano 4 on Pixel devices enables powerful on-device AI, allowing for low-latency, real-time intelligent features through the ML Kit GenAI Prompt API. Developers can utilize self-service tools and Gemini models to build smart capabilities directly on the hardware. Android skills further accelerate development by providing AI-optimized instructions for agents and tools, simplifying complex workflows. By exploring adaptive guidance, creating glanceable Wear OS experiences, and integrating on-device AI, developers can shape the future of the Pixel ecosystem.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/pixel-app-experience-made-by-google.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 12

Bring one-handed gestures to your Wear OS app

One-handed gestures offer a convenient, touch-free way to interact with smartwatches. Introduced with Wear OS 6.1 on Pixel Watch, they facilitated actions like controlling timers and calls. Wear OS 7 expands this with a new Gestures framework, empowering OEMs and developers to integrate gesture control. Developers can now incorporate these gestures into their Wear Compose apps using the 1.7 beta release. The framework supports two main interaction patterns: a primary action, like double-pinching to start a timer, and a dismiss action, like a wrist turn to go back. These features are available on Pixel Watch 3 and newer, with the framework open for adoption by all Wear OS manufacturers. Integrating gestures involves defining gesture configurations, initializing indicator states, and applying the Modifier.oneHandedGesture to interactive components. This modifier activates visual hints, called gesture indicators, to guide users. Examples include using a double-pinch for a button press or scrolling through content. Components like OneHandedGestureClickIndicator and OneHandedGestureScrollIndicator help implement these visual cues. Spotify is an early adopter, utilizing one-handed gestures for seamless music playback control without screen interaction. Developers can begin experimenting with these gestures today by updating their Wear Compose dependency and targeting Wear OS 7.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/one-handed-gestures-wear-os.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 12

What's new in the Jetpack Compose August '26 release

The Jetpack Compose August 2026 release, version 1.12, is now stable. This update introduces Mesh Gradients and Wide Color Gamut support for richer visuals. It also brings structural layout features like named areas in Grid and seamless integration with Android's Credential Manager. For developers, the compile SDK is updated to API 37, requiring a minimum AGP 9.2.0, and Modifier.onFirstVisible() is now deprecated in favor of Modifier.onVisibilityChanged(). Graphics capabilities are enhanced with MeshGradientPainter for multi-point gradients and full pipeline support for Wide Color Gamut and HDR rendering. The experimental Styles API continues to be built, focusing on type safety and custom design systems. Runtime optimizations include a Keyed SideEffect overload for more performant one-shot effects. Animation features now include DeferredTargetAnimation graduation and new composables for two-stage transitions with manual control and seamless handoff. Text editing gains new APIs for rich-text formatting in BasicTextField and programmatic control over text selection via SelectionState. Credential Manager integration allows text fields to prompt for passkeys and saved credentials. Layout enhancements include named areas in experimental Grid layouts for easier complex 2D arrangement. Performance improvements focus on startup, aiming for Time to Initial Display comparable to Views. Testing upgrades offer improved test synchronization with new APIs like hasPendingWork and runWithoutImplicitWait.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/jetpack-compose-august-2026-release.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 12

Media3 1.11 - What's new?

Media3 1.11 is now available, introducing significant updates for Android media applications. The release enhances Jetpack Compose UI modules with customizable player layouts, interactive gestures, and efficient short-form video preloading via PlayerPool. A new MiniController Composable offers a compact playback display, and expanded state holders improve metadata and error observation within Compose. Cast integration has been modernized to support the SystemUI Output Switcher for a unified output experience. The release also introduces a Ktor HTTP client network extension, providing a Kotlin-first data source option. New muxing utilities for Ogg and WAV files have been added, alongside improved container parsing capabilities for MP4 and Matroska. Playback enhancements include support for HAGC dynamic HDR metadata on supported devices for a more consistent HDR experience. MediaSession now features asynchronous connection handling and defaults to a more secure configuration for untrusted controllers. These updates aim to provide developers with greater control, richer interactions, and improved performance for media playback and editing.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/media3-1-11-whats-new.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 11

Inside Android Skills - Built for deprecation

The Android Skills project aims to address knowledge gaps in state-of-the-art language models. Official skills are intentionally developed for highly specific, rapidly evolving areas like new API versions or advanced tooling. General skills are generally discouraged as they consume valuable tokens without significant benefit for well-informed models. Each skill undergoes rigorous evaluation to ensure it provides demonstrable value before release, akin to integration tests in software development. These evaluations are performed using various language models and agents, with access to official documentation. The Android Knowledge Base, accessible via Android Studio or CLI, is recommended as a single, efficient tool for accessing official documentation. Pull requests for new skills are disabled due to reliance on internal, non-open-source evaluation infrastructure, though community feedback is actively sought through issue filing. Basic or core skills can be beneficial when prompts are vague, when using smaller, less capable models, when refactoring legacy code, or when deviating from standard architectural patterns. The community provides numerous valuable skills for Compose and Kotlin, but developers should prioritize reputable sources. The ultimate goal is for the knowledge contained in skills to be integrated into future models, rendering them obsolete over time.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/08/android-skills-philosophy.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Aug 6

Delivering safer, age-appropriate experiences on Google Play

Google Play's top priority is providing a safe online experience and protecting users from harm, and to achieve this, they have been investing in baseline protections and empowering parents with tools to make decisions for their families. Google Play also aims to empower developers to deliver age-appropriate experiences based on their app's content. The Google Play Age Signals API is a privacy-preserving tool that allows parents to share their child's age range with apps, enabling developers to tailor their in-app safety experiences and content. This API is being expanded to all Play developers globally, with the experience first being rolled out to users in Australia and Canada by mid-August, and a full global rollout later this year. The Play Age Signals API puts parents in control, allowing them to share their child's age range directly with apps, and also enables adults to easily share their age when prompted by the app developer. Developers receive the signals they need to tailor their own in-app safety experiences and content for users in an age-appropriate way, and they have the flexibility to choose how they integrate safety signals. The API simplifies safety settings for parents, putting age-sharing controls in one place, directly inside the Google Family Link app, and parents have a choice to share their child's age range, which can be updated or turned off at any time. The Play Age Signals API builds upon a strong foundation of established safety features and strict policies enforced on Google Play, including rigorous safety standards for apps designed for families and built-in tools for developers to manage who can discover their apps. The expansion of the Play Age Signals API globally adds a powerful new tool to Google Play's existing safety suite, helping parents and developers work together to make Google Play a safer and more trustworthy place for families. By providing a reliable signal, Google Play enables developers to retain complete agency to tailor their app's content, features, and settings to match their audience, and this helps to create a safer online experience for all users.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/07/google-play-age-signals-api-safer-experiences.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Jul 29

How R8 made Kotlin Coroutines on Android 2x faster

The Android team has been working on optimizing the performance of coroutines in Android apps, particularly those using Kotlin. The kotlinx.atomicfu library, which is used by kotlinx.coroutines, was found to be a bottleneck due to its use of AtomicReferenceFieldUpdater, which has a significant overhead due to reflection checks. To address this issue, the R8 compiler has been updated to optimize most AtomicFieldUpdater calls into Unsafe variants, resulting in a 2x to 4x performance improvement. This optimization is available in AGP 9.2.0 and later versions, and it has a significant impact on the performance of Jetpack Compose, which uses coroutines extensively. The optimization works by replacing AtomicFieldUpdater calls with calls to Unsafe, which eliminates the need for reflection checks. The R8 compiler can optimize these calls statically, resulting in a significant performance improvement. The optimization has been tested and verified through benchmarks, which show a 2x improvement in coroutine performance. Additionally, the ART team is working on implementing similar optimizations natively at the VM level, which will provide further performance improvements. The optimization is available by default when using AGP 9.2.0 or later, and it can also be used directly with R8 9.2.0. The performance improvement is significant, with some benchmarks showing a 2x improvement in coroutine performance. Overall, the optimization is an important step in improving the performance of Android apps that use coroutines and Kotlin. The optimization has been successfully tested and implemented, and it is now available for use in Android apps. The Android team continues to work on optimizing the performance of Android apps, and this optimization is an important part of those efforts.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/07/how-r8-made-kotlin-coroutines-2x-faster.html android-developers.googleblog.com
RSS Hunter RSS Hunter • Jul 27