On Tuesday, Google hosted the I/O 2021 event where it announced the new version of Android: Android 12: Android 12 comes with a completely redesigned UI, plethora of customization features and more.

Android 12 release date

According to Google, the Beta version of Android 12 is already available to be downloaded and installed on phones from Oppo, Nokia, OnePlus, Xiaomi and needless to say, the last few batches of the Pixels. Historically, Google releases the public version of the OS in September or October. However, we must warn some tech enthusiasts that it may just take the better part of this year for you to receive the update.

Android 12: Best Features

Color extraction and customization

Color-Extraction-and-Customization

In the new Android 12 update, the OS will figure out the colour scheme of the phone’s wallpaper and perform what Google likes to call, a ‘color extraction’. In a nutshell it means that the OS will analyze the dominant and the background colors that forms a user’s wallpaper and then apply those colors to the overall system.

Prior to this update, Android users were made to choose certain colors to apply to the notification, icons and settings shade. Thanks to color extraction, the process will now run on auto-pilot and once a user changes their wallpaper, the colors of the notification shade, icons, buttons and widgets will match with the chosen wallpaper.

New Always on Display

Android’s Always-on Display has always been a uniquely underrated feature. Using this feature users could just take a peek and know if they have received a notification. In Android 12, the AOD has gotten a complete overhaul. The new AOD features a huge clock that will be on the middle of the display. The lock screen beneath the AOD also features the same clock. Some users may find the clock consuming screen space, but the demonstration showed that the clock serves a purpose.

The demonstration showed that when a person will receive a notification, the clock on the lockscreen will get small and move to the upper left corner of the display to make room for the notification. This will ensure that a user will be able to tell if they have or have not received a notification with just a peek.

Just imagine if you have kept your phone away from you, you can just glance and see if you’ve received a notification or not by the size of the huge clock.

New Notification shade

New-Notification-Shade

 

Following the overall design revamp agenda, the developers over at Android decided to give the notification a new shade of paint as well. After several iterations of the Android OS, the company has finally introduced a completely new Notification panel which falls in place with the overall changes the OS comes with.

Perhaps the biggest change one may notice is the introduction of Quick Tiles. Gone are the circular icons and new rectangular rounds have replaced those circular ones. This was not only an aesthetic change but serves a larger purpose as well because now more information can be crammed into each of these quick tiles.

Going a little further and one may notice that the notifications have also gotten a complete revamp. Android 12 users get an ‘always’there’ media player, an all-new brightness slider, and a tons of other little but neat changes that makes the overall experience more cohesive.

One-handed mode

Gone are the days when display sizes were limited to sizes that can be managed with one hand. Over the course of years, OEMs have decided to go along the ‘bigger is better’ approach and thus, sizes of displays are getting as large as 6.5 inches and above.

Unfortunately, the size of a human palm remains universally similar for the most part. To make the experience of using the phone with one hand better, Android has introduced the one-handed mode in the 12th version. Once enabled, you just have to swipe down from any point on your screen. Once you swipe down, buttons, icons and features will be put in place so that you can quickly reach and get started with whatever you choose to.