🐛 Android 14 QPR2 Beta 3.1 and 3.2 feedback survey is now available.

This survey is relevant for Pixel users who have installed the latest Android 14 QPR2 Beta 3.1 (3.2 if you own a Pixel 5a) on their devices. You can check this by going to Settings>About Phone, the build number should say AP11.231215.009 (AP11.231215.010 if you own a Pixel 5a)

Also, don't forget to report your bugs via the 🐛 Feedback app.

🔗 Survey Link

Google News | En

Pixel Fold 2 prototype real photo has been leaked online.

Following the info about the processor and RAM capacity, an anonymous 🔗 Android Authority's source shared a photo of the actual device. Compared to the first generation, the external display of the Pixel Fold 2 will be narrower and the internal display will be more square in aspect ratio.

The photo also shows an updated camera unit located at the top left of the cover. It consists of four sensors that likely include a primary wide-angle lens, a secondary ultra-wide-angle lens, a tertiary periscopic telephoto lens, and an unknown quaternary lens.

The device will also get a more rounded inner and outer displays and a more premium, possibly aluminum frame. The internal display will have a cutout for the camera in the top right corner, whereas the first gen had it hidden in the top bezel.

It's worth noting that this is a prototype and the design of the device could still change before release.

🔗 Android Authority

😎 Google News | En

Google has released the first beta version of Android 14 QPR3 (June release).

The company has opened beta testing for the system image, which will be released in June this year. The beta program is available for devices starting with Pixel 5a and newer. The 14 QPR2 testing program appears to have come to an end and the next update for it will be the March stable release.

List of fixes:

• Fixed an issue where Circle to Search wasn't available to Beta users. This feature was unintentionally released only to non-Beta users.

❗️If you're currently on Android 14 QPR2 Beta 3.1 planned to upgrade to a stable system image without data loss next month, don't upgrade to Android 14 QPR3 or the next window of opportunity won't appear until June.

Build number: AP21.240119.009
Security Patch: February 2024

🔗 OTAs
🔗 Factory Images
🔗 Beta program opt-in

😎 Google News | En

Google One has added a new Google One AI Premium plan with Gemini Advanced for $19.99.

The Google One AI Premium plan offers 2TB of storage and all the benefits of regular Premium, but in addition you get access to Gemini Ultra 1.0, Google's most powerful AI model yet.

Gemini Ultra processes queries more efficiently, follows instructions, programs, gets creative, and reasons. This model can analyze and explain information, as well as write high quality code in many programming languages.

And Gemini will soon be available in other Google services, such as Gmail and Docs. Writing and finalizing text, generating unique images, and improving video quality in Meet through noise reduction, sharpening, and light correction in the frame.

The Google One AI Premium plan costs $19.99 for US, €21.99 for EU and £18,99 for UK per month, with the first 2 months free trial for all.

🔗 Google One AI Premium plan

Redditor u/pxp121kr on r/singularity was first to spot this.

The Gemini chatbot will be available at: gemini.google.com/ . For now, the link is not working. But, if you open bard.google.com/ you will see "Bard Advanced".

UPD: looks like the gemini.google.com/ link is starting to work.

😎 Google News | En

Gemini app is now live on play store!

🔗 Play store link

*available only in US on english

Requires Android 12+ device with at least 4Gb of RAM

😎 Google News | En

Here's the Google Play Services 'Call Cast' feature settings page.

Cross-device services have been in development since last August. And at the time when this page was first discovered as Link your devices, it had a single 'Call transfer' toggle on it. And later, it got Internet Sharing on it as well.

In the latest beta version of Google Play Services, the company has added a separate settings page renaming the 'Call transfer' to 'Call Cast'. This feature will allow you to move calls between your nearby devices, that logged in to your Google Account. This feature might be using the Telecom Jetpack library.

The Cross-device services is still not enabled, but judging by the way Google is ramping up the pace of finalization, the feature is expected to start working very soon.

😎 Google News | En

🤖 The first developer preview of Android 15 may be released this Thursday.

In a comment on the Android Open Source Project, a Google employee explicitly named the scheduled release date for the first Developer Preview of Android 15, calling it "Android V" ("Vanilla Ice Cream"):

Maybe makes sense to wait until Android V will be available? Its first Developer preview is scheduled for Feb 15

If that's indeed the case, those interested should get their devices ready to install Android 15 DP1 as early as this Thursday. It's worth remembering that Developer Preview builds ❗️are not recommended for everyday use❗️, as they can be extremely unstable (even worse than Beta).

These builds are primarily recommended for developers to try out new APIs and test their apps on the new Android version.

🔗 via 9to5Google

😎 Google News | En

Google has started rolling out updated weather icons in the At a Glance and Weather widgets.

Ever since Google released the updated Weather page, the last non-updated element has been the icons in the weather and "At a Glance" widgets, even though the new Weather page UI used new icons. Thankfully, it looks like that's about to change.

Some users (thanks @Sari1Rahman) have started seeing updated weather icons in their widgets. It is unknown at this time if this is global or if Google will roll out this change gradually over the next few months.

😎 Google News | En

🤖 Android 15 Developer Preview 1 has been released!

Google opens testing of Android 15 in the first developer preview build. The testing program is split into 2 Developer Preview and at least 4 Beta builds. The first Beta build is scheduled for April this year. And the release will take place after August.

Android 15 testing is available for Pixel 6 and newer devices. The first Developer Preview build is installed manually only. Its installation automatically subscribes you to over-the-air updates. That is, the second DP will already come over the air.

Build number: AP31.240119.016

🔗 Factory images

🔗 OTA images — can be installed without data reset and bootloader unlocking

🔗 Android 15 Program Overview

#Android15

😎 Google News | En

List of known issues in Android 15 Developer Preview 1.

❗️❗️❗️ An issue with sideloading the Developer Preview 1 OTA build can sometimes cause the device to show a "Device is corrupted" message after sideloading is completed (the device will not be able to boot into the system). To work around this issue, Google recommend that developers flash a factory image to test devices whenever possible instead of sideloading an OTA system image.

• While adding a face model for Face Unlock, the preview screen appears to be trimmed or cropped.
• When an app window is transitioning to picture-in-picture (PiP) mode, the PiP window disappears if the device is rotated before the PiP transition finishes.
• When a locked SIM card is inserted into an unlocked device, the user is not prompted to enter the PIN to unlock the SIM card. To work around this issue, lock and unlock the device manually.

Apps
• The Google Play Store sometimes crashes with a null pointer exception when trying to update apps.
• The Google TV app sometimes fails to initiate video playback and instead displays a "Play Movies & TV is temporarily unavailable" message.

😎 Google News | En

Android 15 DP1: The brightness slider in Quick Settings got a haptic feedback.

You'll feel a soft vibration as you move the brightness slider, and you'll feel a click at the edges.

🔊 Turn the sound to the max

#Android15

😎 Google News | En

Android 15 DP1: New option for developers to "Show HDR/SDR ratio".

Android 13 added support for SDR-dimming — Reducing the brightness of SDR content on the screen while showing HDR content at the same time. That is, when HDR content appears on the screen, the screen brightness is increased to accommodate the luminance range range of the HDR content. At the same time, any SDR content that is also displayed on the screen is smoothly dimmed when the screen brightness is increased, so that the perceived brightness of the SDR content does not change.

In Android 15 DP1, a new "Show HDR/SDR ratio" toggle has been added to the Settings / System / Developers options. When you turn it on, the ratio indicator will appear on the top right, which has a value of 1.00 when there is no HDR content on the screen, 4.99 when viewing UHDR photos in Google Photos or Files, and 7.99 when watching HDR videos in YouTube.

*SDR - Standard Dynamic Range
*HDR - High Dynamic Range

#Android15

😎 Google News | En