Android 13 is not as big as Android 12, which was a monster.
Google is making quick progress on the next version of Android. The company announced yesterday that beta 4 of Android 13 is the “final” beta and that the official release is “coming in the coming weeks.”
After Android 12’s big changes, Android 13 seems to be a smaller update with a focus on tablet features and improvements. A lot of Android 13 is building on the work from Android 12 and the tablet-focused mini-release, Android 12L. There are more color options for Material You and more changes to the new media player for notifications. The tablet interface has a new button for the taskbar that opens an app drawer. It also lets you drag and drop notifications between two screens. With a foreground app task manager and new permission that makes apps ask for notification access, you have more control over apps. Under the hood, there is a lot of power for virtualization and Bluetooth LE Audio support. Even a standard QR Code reader is now available.
Android 13 has been done for a while, so this new release only fixes bugs. Google says that the Play Store is ready to accept apps that work with Android 13. If you have a new Pixel phone, you can sign up for the beta at android.com/beta.
As for the final release, the last beta version of Android 12 came out in September, and the final source code was made available a month later, in October. Google waited to release the official builds until the Pixel 6 came out. No one knows how Android 13 will be handled when it comes out. The final release date on Google’s timeline is always left open on purpose.
