Google Messages is rolling out a new UI for sending pictures!

The new UI unifies the camera/gallery and also adds a button to change the media quality. The default quality is compressed but you can send in original quality, finally!

9to5Google reported on the rollout of this new UI last night, after which I checked and saw that I had it on my device.

Google is also rolling out an updated UI for Circle to Search that adds a button to show additional functions!

I quite like this change, as previously, Circle to Search was getting quite cramped with all the new features Google was cramming into it.

This new UI has been rolling out to several users in the past few days, but after receiving another tip about it last night, I noticed I had it myself.

The Android Settings app now displays your Google account name and profile picture instead of just "Google."

This change is slowly rolling out to more and more users. I don't personally see it, but several others have it. The "Google" entry is injected by the Google Play Services app, so this is a server-side change.

Let me know if you see it!

A major update to scrcpy is out, bringing a very nifty feature: Virtual display support!

scrcpy can now create virtual displays that you can mirror instead of your device's main display. This means you can stream apps to your PC and still use your phone at the same time.

Android by default uses the secondary launcher activity on secondary displays, including virtual ones, so you can even effectively mirror a desktop experience to your PC.

Note that this was already somewhat possible before, but you had to manually create a virtual display through developer options, find its display ID, then specify that display ID when launching scrcpy.

🔒Android 15 QPR2 is preparing a new way to declutter your lock screen notifications

The new lock screen notification minimalism option will minimize notifications, letting you see your beautiful lock screen wallpaper.

Details + screenshots can be found in this article.

🖥️ Google preps new features for Android desktop windowing, including a minimize button

More improvements are coming to Android's desktop windowing mode.

The VP of Xiaomi Global says the company will be able to do monthly updates next year. Curious to see which devices they'll do this for.

Xiaomi's official update policy - at least for devices that are Android Enterprise Recommended - guarantees an update every 90 days. Xiaomi also currently promises 4 generations of Android OS updates for its latest flagships in the 14 and 14T series.

The OnePlus 13 will be launching in the U.S., Canada, and other parts of the world in January 2025!

It'll be coming in three different colorways: Midnight Ocean, Black Eclipse, and Arctic Dawn. The Midnight Ocean model will have "micro-fiber vegan leather" which OnePlus says is designed to "strike a perfect balance between a luxurious handfeel and scratch and scuff resistance."

I haven't had a chance to try a phone with the Snapdragon 8 Elite yet, so I'm looking forward to this launch!

Google has apparently started doing LTS releases of Android, though only for Android Automotive at the moment.

This makes sense since the OS in car dashboards is going to be updated less frequently than other form factors, plus cars are going to be kept around longer than handhelds.

No idea how long Google will maintain these LTS releases, though. H/T to Al Sutton for spotting this.

Google does do security patch backports already, for about ~3.5 years after the AOSP release of a new OS version. However, it's always been recommended to update the OS anyways as not every patch will be marked or recognized as a security fix. LTS releases are better supported when it comes to security fixes.

Great news for those of you considering switching from iOS to Android:

Your Live Photos will be carried over when using the Android Switch app!

This is already live for Pixel phones but will be expanding to more devices in the next few weeks!

Google announced at I/O that Health Connect on Android would let apps sync more than 30 days worth of data (historical reads) as well as read data in the background (background reads).

Both of these features are already live in the version of Health Connect that ships with Android 15 as well as Android 14 devices with SDK Extension version 13.

However, apps need to be updated to take advantage of these features. Version 1.1.0-alpha09 of the Health Connect Jetpack library added support for the background reads feature, while -alpha10 added support for the historical reads feature.

Once apps add support (likely will start happening after v1.1.0 exits alpha), then you'll be able to manage their access to historical/background data through the Health Connect app, as shown above.

The Linux Terminal app in Android 15 QPR2 is fairly barebones in terms of what it can let you do right now, but a lot of improvements are in the works, including:

* Hardware acceleration support. If the file /sdcard/linux/virglrenderer exists on the device, VirGL for the VM will be enabled. This requires enabling ANGLE for the Terminal app.

* Graphical environment support. By installing Wayland compositor and VNC backend, you can enable a graphical environment.

(Note: I tried this already, but it didn't work - likely need to wait for a future update.)

* A backup option to preserve your Linux VM install. (A restore option is still in the works.)

* Forced portrait mode if there's no hardware keyboard attached.

* NDK APIs for AVF.

* Removal of the VMLauncher app and full integration into the Terminal app. (vm_launcher_lib is being integrated into Terminal.)

* Google's compiled Debian images will soon be downloaded from Google's download servers rather than GitHub. eg. here's a static link to the latest AArch64 images.

Google has announced that it's hardening Play Integrity API verdicts so they're less spoofable but also faster and more privacy-friendly.

- Improved device integrity verdicts on Android 13+ will require the use of hardware-backed security signals using Android Platform Key Attestation, making them much harder to bypass. Google will adjust verdicts when it detects "security threats across Android SDK versions, such as when there is evidence of excessive activity or key compromise."

- The Play Integrity API will now have the "same level of reliability and support across all Android form factors."

- Because these new verdicts reduce the number of device signals that need to be collected and evaluated, Google says verdict latency can improve by up to 80%.

Developers can opt in to use these new verdicts today or wait until May 2025 which is when all API integrations will automatically transition.

In addition:

- The "meets-strong-integrity" response is being updated to require a security patch level within the last year on devices running Android 13+.

- A new device attributes field lets apps adjust their behavior based on the user's Android SDK version.

- All optional verdict signals are being standardized across apps, games, SDKs, and more.