The History of Android is long and storied. It began from its humble beginnings, to its feud with iOS and finally its domination of the world. Android is the most popular OS in the world today, more than any other OS both on mobile and PC.
Android’s popularity is due in part to its open sourced nature and easy customization. This open nature has encouraged software developers to make apps for android, introducing new features not found on other OS. This easy customization has pulled in hundreds of millions of users who enjoy being free from the restrictive nature of other OS.
Read: The history of mobile operating systems
This post intends to discuss the history of Android in full.
Android inc. was founded in 2003 in Palo Alto, California by Rich Miner, Nick Sears, Chris White and Andy Rubin. It was originally designed to pair digital cameras to PCs for cloud storage.
In 2005, it was bought by Google for $50 million (US Dollars). Rubin stayed at Google as head of Android. He left in 2013 and returned with the Essential phone in 2014. In 2007, Google helped form the Open Handset Alliance which included HTC, Motorola, Qualcomm, Texas Instruments, T-Mobile etc.
The Open Handset Alliance then adopted Android as its operating system. The answer to Apple’s iOS and subsequently the iPhone.
The history of Android updates
Android public Beta was released for testing by developers in November of 2007. The next year, the first phone running Android 1.0 was released. Its name is the HTC Dream. It had a keyboard and looked more like a BlackBerry phone. The original Android version had Maps, Youtube and HTML browsers. It also supported Android market (an app store), email, gallery and allowed users to change the wallpaper on their home screen.
Android 1.5 Cupcake 🧁
Android 1.5 Cupcake is the third version of Android. It was named by the project manager Ryan Gibson as it did not have a name before. Others had called the previous Android 1.1 ‘petit four‘.
This would start a tradition of naming android versions after sweet treats. Irina Blok designed the Android logo.
The first Samsung Galaxy as well as the HTC Hero ran on Android 1.5 Cupcake. This Android version was released in September 2007. It allowed users upload to YouTube, had support for widgets, video recording, screen rotation and use of third party keyboards.
Read: What are software platforms?
Android 1.6 Donut 🍩
Android 1.6 Donut is the fourth version of Android. It became available in September 15th of 2009.
It had support for improved CDMA (2G) technology. There was also voice and text entry search enhanced to include bookmark history, contacts, and the web. Other important updates here are the inclusion of control widgets for managing WiFi, Bluetooth and GPS as well as integrating the camera, camcorder and gallery into one app.
Android 2.0 (2.1) Eclair
The next major update for Android came a month later in October of 2009. It was named Eclair.
Eclair came with feature updates such as text-to-speech, live wallpaper support, improved maps navigation, pressure sensitive touch, improved optimization for hardware etc. There were also numerous camera updates, improved typing speed, refreshed browser UI and support for Bluetooth 2.1 as well as bigger screen sizes.
Android 2.2 Frozen Yoghurt (Froyo)
On May 2010, Android 2.2 aka Froyo was released.
Froyo was loaded with lots of massive new features such as speed, memory, and performance optimizations. There were also improvements in the UI as well as in the app launcher.
It also brought support for WiFi hotspot and USB tethering, Adobe flash, file upload in the browser app, alphanumeric passwords, high ppi displays etc. Users for the first time, now had the option to disable data connection on a mobile network as well as install apps to the SD card.
Android 2.3 Gingerbread
Four months later, an update known as Gingerbread would be made available for Android phones.
Major new features included NFC, multi camera support and video calls. It also had support for extra large screen sizes as well as higher resolutions. The keyboard/typing is faster and the copy-paste is now available.
Android 3.0 Honeycomb
The honeycomb (3.0) was designed for tablets and other mobile devices with large displays.
The first device to run on Android 3.0 is the Motorola Xoom tablet. It had a redesigned UI and introduced the system bar with recent apps menu. Major updates include support for multi-core SoCs, USB OTG, keyboard and game controllers.
Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich
This update became available in October of 2011.
One of the biggest features here was the addition of the three soft buttons at the bottom of the home screen. Other major ones include screenshot, face unlock, swipe-to-dismiss recent apps, data monitoring, 1080p (FHD) video recording and camera app improvements. It was during this period that Android market was renamed to Google Playstore.
Android 4.1 Jellybean
After an 8 month wait, the Jellybean 4.1 update was made available in June of 2012.
This update however did not boast a lot of new features. That being said, some important Android features came with this one.
They include support for: Bluetooth 4.0 (low energy), USB audio, external displays (screen casting/mirroring), OpenGL ES 3.0 (for improved game graphics), 4K resolution support etc. Chrome browser was also now fully supported as well.
Android 4.4 KitKat
I have a very fond place in my heart for this very version as it was my first android experience.
It was released in September of 2013. It was optimized for phones with 512MB of RAM. OK Google, the precursor to Google Assistant was introduced for voice assisted Google search.
New features for this version include NFC, wireless printing, screen recording, infrared blaster support etc.
Android 5.0 Lollipop 🍭
This android version became available as an over-the-air (OTA) update in November of 2014.
This is the first android version to support 64bit SoCs. The main new features included OpenGL ES 3.1 support was now available for GPUs, lock screen notifications, official dual sim support, High Definition voice calls, Google smart lock, device protection, OTA device updates etc.
Android 6.0 Marshmallow
Codenamed Android M, version 6.0 became available on August 17th, 2015. For the first time in the history of Android, updates were now a yearly event.
Some of the more popular features include a vertically scrolling app drawer with apps arranged alphabetically and finger print unlock. There was also support for USB C and Android Pay.
Android 7.0 Nougat
This is the 7th major version update of Android and it became available in August of 2016.
Google Assistant became a fully fledged AI entity in this version. This version introduced features such as split screen, quick app switching, JIT compiler (to speed up apps), Vulkan API (faster 3D rendering for Graphics), virtual reality, battery usage alerts etc.
Android 8.0 Oreo
Named after a famous cookie, the stable version of 8.0 was finally released in August of 2017.
Notable new features include Picture in picture support, Auto-fill API for passwords and Google play protect. There is also faster boot time and downloadable system wide fonts.
Android Oreo Go for devices with low RAM was also introduced and users could now view the battery level of connected Bluetooth devices.
Android 9 Pie 🥧
This version officially showed up in August of 2018. By now it was already an established trend that Android updates are a yearly event.
Android 9 brought gesture navigation, which is something I can no longer do without. The UI was also redesigned, call recording was officially disabled and support for Vulkan 1.1 was added.
Android 10
By the time Android 10 rolled around, Google decided to ditch the naming scheme of using tasty treats. From now on, all Android versions would be addressed by the numbers or an alphabet.
Android 10 (Q) became available on September 3rd, 2019.
This version introduced improved gesture navigation, full support for system wide dark mode, smart app permissions, support for foldable screens etc.
Android 11
Android 11 (R) was released in September of 2020. It carried Google’s new policy of simply naming Android
This new update introduced performance updates, better system wide dark mode, improved navigation and chat bubbles.
I’ll say that whilst the performance updates are very good. I do not the new chat bubbles.
Android 12
This is the 12th stable release of Android. It was announced in February and released in October of 2021.
The full list of features include:
- Easier Wi-Fi sharing
- AVIF image support
- Material You
- Scrolling Screenshot
- One Handed Mode
- Android Runtime (ART) module added to the updatable core OS components via Google Play.
- Area Magnification can zoom in any content on device
- Extra Dim reduces brightness below minimum level
- Bold Text
- Greyscale
- Mic and Camera indicator and toggle
- Option to choose precise or approximate location
- Privacy Dashboard
- Gestures can work in immersive mode
- Performance improvements to system services to improve transitions, power efficiency, and reduce app startup times
- Third party app stores now have the ability to update apps without constantly asking the user for permission
Android 13
Android 13 is the current version of Android and the successor to Android 12.
New features include:
- Apps are now required to request permission from the user before they are able to send notifications.
- The number of active apps is now shown at the bottom of the notifications panel, a tap on it opens a detailed panel which lets the user stop each of them
- Support for Bluetooth LE Audio and the LC3 audio codec
- ART update with a new garbage collector (GC) utilizing the Linux userfaultfd system call. It reduces memory pressure, compiled code size, jank and prevents the risk of killing apps because of low memory during GC.
Android 14
This is the upcoming version of Android. It was announced in February of 2023.
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