Android variations: A residing historical past from 1.0 to 13
Explore Android’s ongoing evolution with this visible timeline of variations, beginning B.C. (Before Cupcake) and going all the best way to 2022’s still-under-development Android 13 launch.
Thinkstock / Google
What a protracted, unusual journey it has been.
From its inaugural launch to right now, Android has remodeled visually, conceptually and functionally — time and time once more. Google’s cell working system could have began out scrappy, however holy moly, has it ever advanced.
Here’s a fast-paced tour of Android model highlights from the platform’s start to current. (Feel free to skip forward when you simply need to see what’s new in Android 12 or Android 13.)
Android variations 1.0 to 1.1: The early days
Android made its official public debut in 2008 with Android 1.0 — a launch so historical it did not also have a cute codename.
Things had been fairly fundamental again then, however the software program did embody a collection of early Google apps like Gmail, Maps, Calendar, and YouTube, all of which had been built-in into the working system — a stark distinction to the extra simply updatable standalone-app mannequin employed right now.
T-Mobile
The Android 1.0 dwelling display and its rudimentary net browser (not but known as Chrome).
[ Further reading: 8 ways to turn Android into a productivity powerhouse ]
Android model 1.5: Cupcake
With early 2009’s Android 1.5 Cupcake launch, the custom of Android model names was born. Cupcake launched quite a few refinements to the Android interface, together with the primary on-screen keyboard — one thing that’d be vital as telephones moved away from the once-ubiquitous bodily keyboard mannequin.
Cupcake additionally introduced in regards to the framework for third-party app widgets, which might shortly flip into one in every of Android’s most distinguishing components, and it supplied the platform’s first-ever choice for video recording.
Android Police (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Cupcake was all in regards to the widgets.
Android model 1.6: Donut
Android 1.6, Donut, rolled into the world within the fall of 2009. Donut stuffed in some essential holes in Android’s middle, together with the power for the OS to function on a wide range of completely different display sizes and resolutions — an element that’d be crucial within the years to come back. It additionally added assist for CDMA networks like Verizon, which might play a key position in Android’s imminent explosion.
Android’s common search field made its first look in Android 1.6.
Android variations 2.0 to 2.1: Eclair
Keeping up the breakneck launch tempo of Android’s early years, Android 2.0, Eclair, emerged simply six weeks after Donut; its “point-one” replace, additionally known as Eclair, got here out a pair months later. Eclair was the primary Android launch to enter mainstream consciousness because of the unique Motorola Droid cellphone and the large Verizon-led advertising marketing campaign surrounding it.
Verizon’s “iDon’t” advert for the Droid.
The launch’s most transformative ingredient was the addition of voice-guided turn-by-turn navigation and real-time site visitors data — one thing beforehand remarkable (and nonetheless basically unmatched) within the smartphone world. Navigation apart, Eclair introduced dwell wallpapers to Android in addition to the platform’s first speech-to-text operate. And it made waves for injecting the once-iOS-exclusive pinch-to-zoom functionality into Android — a transfer usually seen because the spark that ignited Apple’s long-lasting “thermonuclear struggle” towards Google.
The first variations of turn-by-turn navigation and speech-to-text, in Eclair.
Android model 2.2: Froyo
Just 4 months after Android 2.1 arrived, Google served up Android 2.2, Froyo, which revolved largely round under-the-hood efficiency enhancements.
Froyo did ship some essential front-facing options, although, together with the addition of the now-standard dock on the backside of the house display in addition to the primary incarnation of Voice Actions, which allowed you to carry out fundamental capabilities like getting instructions and making notes by tapping an icon after which talking a command.
Google’s first actual try at voice management, in Froyo.
Notably, Froyo additionally introduced assist for Flash to Android’s net browser — an choice that was important each due to the widespread use of Flash on the time and due to Apple’s adamant stance towards supporting it by itself cell units. Apple would ultimately win, after all, and Flash would turn out to be far much less frequent. But again when it was nonetheless all over the place, having the ability to entry the total net with none black holes was a real benefit solely Android may provide.
Android model 2.3: Gingerbread
Android’s first true visible id began coming into focus with 2010’s Gingerbread launch. Bright inexperienced had lengthy been the colour of Android’s robotic mascot, and with Gingerbread, it grew to become an integral a part of the working system’s look. Black and inexperienced seeped all around the UI as Android began its gradual march towards distinctive design.
JR Raphael / IDG
It was straightforward being inexperienced again within the Gingerbread days.
Android 3.0 to three.2: Honeycomb
2011’s Honeycomb interval was a bizarre time for Android. Android 3.0 got here into the world as a tablet-only launch to accompany the launch of the Motorola Xoom, and thru the following 3.1 and three.2 updates, it remained a tablet-exclusive (and closed-source) entity.
Under the steerage of newly arrived design chief Matias Duarte, Honeycomb launched a dramatically reimagined UI for Android. It had a space-like “holographic” design that traded the platform’s trademark inexperienced for blue and positioned an emphasis on benefiting from a pill’s display house.
JR Raphael / IDG
Honeycomb: When Android bought a case of the holographic blues.
While the idea of a tablet-specific interface did not final lengthy, a lot of Honeycomb’s concepts laid the groundwork for the Android we all know right now. The software program was the primary to make use of on-screen buttons for Android’s fundamental navigational instructions; it marked the start of the top for the everlasting overflow-menu button; and it launched the idea of a card-like UI with its tackle the Recent Apps record.
Android model 4.0: Ice Cream Sandwich
With Honeycomb performing because the bridge from previous to new, Ice Cream Sandwich — additionally launched in 2011 — served because the platform’s official entry into the period of contemporary design. The launch refined the visible ideas launched with Honeycomb and reunited tablets and telephones with a single, unified UI imaginative and prescient.
ICS dropped a lot of Honeycomb’s “holographic” look however stored its use of blue as a system-wide spotlight. And it carried over core system components like on-screen buttons and a card-like look for app-switching.
JR Raphael / IDG
The ICS dwelling display and app-switching interface.
Android 4.0 additionally made swiping a extra integral methodology of getting across the working system, with the then-revolutionary-feeling capacity to swipe away issues like notifications and up to date apps. And it began the gradual means of bringing a standardized design framework — generally known as “Holo” — all all through the OS and into Android’s app ecosystem.
Android variations 4.1 to 4.3: Jelly Bean
Spread throughout three impactful Android variations, 2012 and 2013’s Jelly Bean releases took ICS’s contemporary basis and made significant strides in fine-tuning and constructing upon it. The releases added loads of poise and polish into the working system and went a good distance in making Android extra inviting for the common person.
Visuals apart, Jelly Bean led to our first style of Google Now — the spectacular predictive-intelligence utility that is sadly since devolved right into a glorified information feed. It gave us expandable and interactive notifications, an expanded voice search system, and a extra superior system for displaying search outcomes basically, with a concentrate on card-based outcomes that tried to reply questions instantly.
Multiuser assist additionally got here into play, albeit on tablets solely at this level, and an early model of Android’s Quick Settings panel made its first look. Jelly Bean ushered in a closely hyped system for putting widgets in your lock display, too — one which, like so many Android options over time, quietly disappeared a pair years later.
JR Raphael / IDG
Jelly Bean’s Quick Settings panel and short-lived lock display widget function.
Android model 4.4: KitKat
Late-2013’s KitKat launch marked the top of Android’s darkish period, because the blacks of Gingerbread and the blues of Honeycomb lastly made their means out of the working system. Lighter backgrounds and extra impartial highlights took their locations, with a clear standing bar and white icons giving the OS a extra modern look.
Android 4.4 additionally noticed the primary model of “OK, Google” assist — however in KitKat, the hands-free activation immediate labored solely when your display was already on and also you had been both at your own home display or contained in the Google app.
The launch was Google’s first foray into claiming a full panel of the house display for its companies, too — at the least, for customers of its personal Nexus telephones and those that selected to obtain its first-ever standalone launcher.
JR Raphael / IDG
The lightened KitKat dwelling display and its devoted Google Now panel.
Android variations 5.0 and 5.1: Lollipop
Google basically reinvented Android — once more — with its Android 5.0 Lollipop launch within the fall of 2014. Lollipop launched the still-present-today Material Design commonplace, which introduced a complete new look that prolonged throughout all of Android, its apps and even different Google merchandise.
The card-based idea that had been scattered all through Android grew to become a core UI sample — one that may information the looks of every thing from notifications, which now confirmed up on the lock display for at-a-glance entry, to the Recent Apps record, which took on an unabashedly card-based look.
JR Raphael / IDG
Lollipop and the onset of Material Design.
Lollipop launched a slew of recent options into Android, together with really hands-free voice management through the “OK, Google” command, assist for a number of customers on telephones and a precedence mode for higher notification administration. It modified a lot, sadly, that it additionally launched a bunch of troubling bugs, a lot of which would not be totally ironed out till the next 12 months’s 5.1 launch.