Android 10 is here and the reception is great and path-breaking amongst the users. Officially, one of the most used mobile operating systems update has been released on September 3, but only for Google Pixel phones. Well, there are some excellent and user-friendly android 10 features introduced in this update which were earlier named as Android Q, but later rebranded as Android 10.
Sameer Samar, Google VP of product management for Android told in the blog: "As a global operating system, it's important that these names are clear and relatable for everyone in the world. We think this change helps make release names simpler and more Intuitive for our global community".
However, users need to remember that Android 10 is not available for everyone. For each phone, OEM has to develop its version of the update and it might take some time to have Android 10 version on your phone.
In this blog, we will discuss some of the best Android 10 features. Let's get started!
New Gesture Navigation
If you remember, Android 9, released last year and had some significant changes for the Android navigation bar. This time, Google has completely changed gesture navigation due to the recent smartphones arriving in the market with unique displays and bottoms. The main aim here is to standardize gesture navigation across all android phones. However, the effects of this update might invite some controversies.
Let's understand it by an example. For Android 9 Pie, if you want to see the recently opened apps, you would swipe up from the pill at the bottom of the screen. However, there was a back button at the bottom of the screen that is replaced with a side-swipe gesture in android 10. It seems nice, but can be confusing at times.
What Google has to say about this change? The main aim to make this change in the new Google Android 10 is to give more power and control to the users who rely more on the back button as compared to the home button. Hence, Google wants to ensure that the users can reach out to the back button easily and comfortably on the phone's screen. Also, with this new gesture control, users would be able to use the smartphone with just one hand. Thankfully, Google allows you to choose a traditional three-icon navigation system in Android 10 settings for users who are not comfortable with these new settings.
introduction of the Dark Mode
In the Android 9 Pie, there were certain elements with the dark mode such as settings panel and some others. In the new Android 10 version, the system UI has a dark theme along with some apps that you have opted for. In addition to that, if you have enabled battery-saving mode, dark mode is enabled by default.
Currently, some of the Google apps such as YouTube, Google Fit, Google Calendar and Google Keep will have a dark mode and as per the officials. Moreover, Google Chrome and Gmail will also be available with the dark theme in a month or so. In the Android 10 beta version, all these apps were spotted in the dark mode.
The dark mode trend is new and here to stay for a long time as users are attracted to it. If you follow the Apple versions, Apple's iOS 13 version has a dark mode theme too. Also, some of the popular apps such as Facebook Messenger, Reddit, Twitter and Feedly have adopted dark mode theme.
Accessibility features
Accessibility features are very significant for users and Google and Apple both understand its importance. They always come up with new accessibility features into their respective mobile operating systems from time to time.
Now, in Android 10, Google came up with live captioning, a completely different feature from Google Live Transcribe, released earlier this year. The most noticeable thing about Live Captioning feature is that it applies the text to pre-recorded videos. It has a local speech analyzer that makes it possible. This analyzer will recognize speech on the mobile phone. However, it is available just on Pixel devices for now and later, it will be launched on other devices.
Another magnificent feature that Google introduced with Android 10 is the support for professional hearing aids. People who wear hearing aids would also be able to connect their phones to it with a special Bluetooth channel.
Privacy and security
Don't you agree that privacy and security are two things we care about when we use our smartphones? Well, Google understands that and has some impeccable new privacy and security features in the latest android version. Two of such features are the way location data is handled in mobile apps and the other is to introduce a new approach to making security fixes available.
Till now, you used to turn off your location tracking feature entirely, but with Android 10, you don't need to do that. You can choose an option where an app can track your location only when you are using that particular app. Even Apple has introduced a similar feature in iOS 13, allowing users to give "allow once" permission for the location. It was the need of the hour, don't you agree?
From now on, Google Play will be updated in a manner that all the privacy updates will be sent to the play store directly rather than waiting for OS updates. You will be able to track how much data these apps are collecting.
Digital wellbeing expands
Do you remember setting those usage timers for apps to track your kid's activities on certain apps? This feature was introduced in Android 9 Pie and is working fine with a great success ratio. However, thanks to Family Link, with Android 10, Google has started Digital Well-being initiative by allowing parents to track the activities of the kids directly from in-built digital Well-being app rather than downloading separate apps for the same.
Also, there is another significant feature introduced in Android 10 called Focus Mode. With this feature, you can pause notifications of all the apps that you find distracting by greying them out from the settings. Once you have activated the focus mode for a certain app, when you visit the app, the phone will remind you about the focus mode activated for the particular app. However, you will still get important messages as notifications even after you have put the app in focus mode. You are not completely off the grid here.
Personalization is Here!
Everyone wants to personalize their smartphones and one of the most popular aspects of Android is that it allows users to do so. With Android 10, users can use a new theming section where you are allowed to change the accent color of the phone. Some of the options are Black, Green, Cinnamon, Purple, Ocean, Space and Orchid.
Conclusion
A new version with unparalleled updates is always a satisfying sight and with Android 10, you will surely feel overwhelmed. However, if you are not using Pixel devices, you have to wait for a bit longer for OEMs to optimize Android 10 in your android devices.
Google has always been the trendsetter when it comes to introducing new features and functionalities that makes the life of users more convenient and easy. We can rightly say that with Android 10, Google will certainly achieve the purpose by all means!
Sagar Bagsariya
Principal Mobile App Developer
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