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Android versions 8.0 and up are still supported as of 2021 October 4th. The information in these articles will need to be updated in the future to reflect newer changes.

Developer: Google

OS family: Android

General availability: October 4, 2021;

Latest release: 12.0.0_r2 (SP1A.210812.016) / October 4, 2021;

Kernel type: Monolithic Kernel (Linux Kernel)

Official website: developer.android.com/about/versions/12

Support status: Supported

Android 12 is the twelfth major release and 19th version of Android, the mobile operating system developed by the Open Handset Alliance led by Google. The first beta was released on May 18, 2021. Android 12 was released publicly on October 4, 2021 and is the latest Android version to date.

Android 12 was announced in an Android blog posted on February 18, 2021. A developer preview was released immediately, with two additional ones planned the following two months. After that, four monthly beta releases were planned, beginning in May, the last one of them reaching platform stability in August, with general availability coming shortly after that.

The second developer preview was released on March 17, 2021, followed by a third preview on April 21, 2021. The first beta build was then released on May 18, 2021. It was followed by beta 2 on June 9, 2021, which got a bugfix update to 2.1 on June 23. Then beta 3 was released on July 14, 2021, getting a bugfix update to beta 3.1 on July 26. Beta 4 was released on August 11, 2021. A fifth beta, not planned in the original roadmap, was released on September 8, 2021. Android 12 stable was released on October 4, 2021.

Android 12 introduces a major refresh to the operating system's Material Design language branded as "Material You", which features larger buttons, an increased amount of animation, and a new style for home screen widgets. A feature, internally codenamed "monet", will allow the operating system to automatically generate a color theme for system menus and supported apps using the colors of the user's wallpaper. The smart home and Wallet areas added to the power menu on Android 11 have been re-located to the notification shade, with Google Assistant remapped to holding the power button.

Android 12 also features native support for taking scrolling screenshots.

Performance improvements have been made to system services such as the WindowManager, PackageManager, system server, and interrupts. It will also offer accessibility improvements for those who are visually impaired. The Android Runtime has been added to Project Mainline, allowing it to be serviced via Play Store.

Android 12 adds support for spatial audio, and MPEG-H 3D Audio, and will support transcoding of HEVC video for backwards compatibility with apps which do not support it. A "rich content insertion" API will ease the ability to transfer formatted text and media between apps, such as via the clipboard. Third party app stores will also be given the ability to update apps without constantly asking the user for permission.

OS-level machine learning functions will be sandboxed within the "Android Private Compute Core", which is expressly prohibited from accessing networks.

Apps requesting location data can now be restricted to having access only to "approximate" location data rather than "precise". Controls to prevent apps from using the camera and microphone system-wide have been added to the quick settings toggles. An indicator will also be displayed on-screen if they are active.

Android 12 lock screen

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Android 12.x is aging, and it is recommended to use it in a virtual machine via Android x86. However, the devices it runs on are still relevant (as of 2021 October 4th) here are some other alternatives to Android 12.x:

LineageOS

GrapheneOS

ReplicantOS

RemixOS (Android 5.0 and higher)

Suggest an alternative

This article on versions of the Android operating system is a stub. You can help by expanding it.

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Wikipedia - Android 12

Other sources are needed, and this article needs LOTS of improvement and original work to prevent it from being half a copy and paste from Wikipedia.

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Written on: 2021 Monday, October 4th at 3:21 pm

Last revised on: 2021 Monday, October 4th at 3:21 pm

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