Starting in August, installing APKs from unverified developers will require a new procedure called Advanced Flow. It involves enabling developer mode, rebooting the device, and waiting 24 hours with biometric verification. After that, you choose: allow the APK installation for 7 days or indefinitely. The procedure is a one-time process and applies to all versions of Android. Will the 24-hour wait stop you from installing APKs outside the store?

Over the years I've tested out pretty much all the Android keyboards, but swipe typing always kept me on GBoard, even though GBoard did not support voice typing for anything except Google, so I had to switch keyboards for that. Recently I learned that HeliBoard has support for gesture typing with the Google library. But I couldn't find any instructions on where to get the necessary files or how to do it. Well, someone posted a link to the file elsewhere so I'll [share it here](https://github.com/erkserkserks/openboard/blob/46fdf2b550035ca69299ce312fa158e7ade36967/app/src/main/jniLibs/arm64-v8a/libjni_latinimegoogle.so). And it works! Extremely well. I can also pin a button for voice typing and then select Transcribro for that (which uses OpenAI Whisper locally and works super well. Another gripe I had with GBoard was the cursor moves way too fast when swiping on the space bar. Not so with Heliboard. You can also swipe backwards from the backspace key and it will highlight text and then delete it when you let go.

I just updated my 2025 Moto G Stylus 5G to Android 16 only to discover the only feature I updated for doesn't work on my device thanks to Qualcomm.

If you haven't seen this yet, Google is planning to require mandatory developer identity verification for all Android apps, including apps distributed outside the Play Store, taking effect September 2026. This affects every independent and open source Android developer directly. This is not just about the Play Store. After September 2026, on any certified Android device, applications from unverified developers will be blocked by default. The only proposed bypass, the "advanced flow", exists only as a blog post and has not appeared in any beta, dev preview, or canary release. No one outside Google has seen it. The community has been fighting back at keepandroidopen.org: - Read the full breakdown of what this means - Sign the open letter (organisations only) - Contact your national regulators — contacts listed by country on the site - Add the countdown banner to your project September 2026 is closer than it looks. The time to push back is now.

Trust me, I push Signal _hard_ and even donate to it monthly. As I'm sure many of you know, there are always a few contacts who unfortunately refuse to use it. In this case: do you prefer to use insecure SMS in something like QUIK SMS or Fossify Messages, or do you prefer to bite the Google bullet to get end-to-end encrypted messages (even if the metadata isn't encrypted)? I can see good arguments for both sides, so I am curious what Lemmy's take is.

Quote from Proton VPN: > Google has known about a bug that breaks VPN apps for 7 months, leaving users exposed with no warning or error, just a VPN app that stopped working in the background. > > If you're using ANY VPN on Android, you can help us by getting Google's attention to fix it. > > We first reported this bug to Google in September 2025. > > Others like Mullvad and Wireguard reported it even earlier, in August. > > Google's response? "I don't see anything unusual." > > The bug corrupts Android's network stack at the system level after a VPN update, causing users to blame their VPN provider. > > Restarting the app doesn't help, with the only fix being a full device reboot or VPN app reinstall, something which most users never figure out. > > This affects several VPN providers on Android 16, and only Google has the access to diagnose it properly. > > After 7 months of waiting, we're now asking publicly: Google, when are you fixing this? > > Issue Tracker Links: > > https://issuetracker.google.com/issues/441315112 > > https://issuetracker.google.com/issues/4474331

Screenshots:  and Gesture navigation is now enabled by default

I'm using e/os and I want to be sure that, when connected to my local network, my local dns server is used, however, no matter what I do, my phone always use google's one. Is there any way to fix this?

Trying to remove the FRP on my phone, but so far just able to get it to load google.com cannot sign in, or install any apps. https://i.imgur.com/Pa1pRkR.jpeg https://i.imgur.com/AHXKLAy.jpeg https://i.imgur.com/U9vnMII.jpeg Any tips

Link to the app: <https://f-droid.org/packages/com.jksalcedo.librefind/>

I have about 5 different apps installed right now, and while I plan to test them all out, curious what people's conclusions are thus far.

> Blackmagic Camera 2.0 is now available for Android phones and, for the first time, selected Android tablets.

I am looking to buy a phone that has very good performance and great camera. I have found the Xiaomi 12t pro for less than 300€, do you think it's a good purchase? Any phones you would recommend on that prixe range that are better? I am mainly looking for hardware here, as if I don't like software I can just change it, but having a good os with good features is never bad.

> The Google Contacts app is redesigning the process of adding a new contact with less clutter and more intuitive features.

 We're almost the bois, synchronization working for multiple accounts, background services and notifications set Also, I updated the readme if you want to checkout We have a logo! Project link github.com/gusVLZ/lemmy_handshake

Hi! My friend is looking for an Android tablet that has an unlockable bootloader and also has a custom ROM. I've checked a lot and every one of them is problematic. Usual brands here are Samsung, Lenovo, Huawei, Honor, TCL, Xiaomi. Apparently Huawei and Honor is out of question since they don't allow unlocking bootloader. TCL is new so no ROMs. Xiaomi seems possible but unlocking a Xiaomi device recently became even more pain. Do you know a decent model from these brands? Preferably 10-12 inch screen.

I use private browsing a lot for the automatic site data clearing. Several browsers restrict taking screenshots in private windows, which is only an inconvenience to me. I hope more browsers will allow the user to decide if screenshots are allowed on their own device.

What non-game paid apps do you use that are worthwhile and still relevant in 2023? For context, I have a decent amount of Google Play credit thanks to Opinion Rewards and a gift card. I'm not looking to start a book or movie collection there, nor sign up for subscription services. But I'm happy to buy the paid/pro version of useful apps. I'm excluding games just because that's a whole topic on its own. Here are some one-time paid apps I've been happy with: - [Tasker](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.dinglisch.android.taskerm&amp;pcampaignid=web_share) - [Titanium Backup](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.keramidas.TitaniumBackupPro&amp;pcampaignid=web_share) - [SD Maid](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=eu.thedarken.sdm.unlocker&amp;pcampaignid=web_share) - [BigBag](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.best.grocery.list.pro&amp;pcampaignid=web_share) - [Wolfram Alpha](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.wolfram.android.alpha&amp;pcampaignid=web_share)

Hi friends. I'm looking to replace as many Google services as I can from my life and I am currently looking for a Google Keep alternative. I want something extremely basic, like Google Keep, that just allows me to collaboratively create to-do lists. Me and my SO have a bunch of to-do lists such as shopping, house chores or work related tasks. I want to be able to share lists with her. I've tried a bunch of apps suggested by some friends but honestly they're more geared to creating documents or elaborate notes. That's not what I want. I just want to create to-do lists and an interface that allows me to do that as simply as possible. Thanks!

Notes are probably the most important thing for me on my phone, ranging from jokes and quotes from my friends and family, to fanfiction and original stories. But I'm planning to buy a new phone soon. It's gonna be a Xiaomi, like my current one, (bc it's affordable) but I'm not sure i will be able to use Mi cloud to conveniently transfer them, because i want to install LineageOS in my next phone. As well as that, there's also my old Samsung Galaxy Ace 4, which i want to transfer the notes from somehow, while it is still working. On that old Samsung, i could send notes via Bluetooth to my sister's phone, but when i tried to send them to this phone, it opened as gibberish (if i remember correctly. That was 4 years ago now) Is there a convenient way to transfer my notes between devices so i won't lose them forever? 😞

Quotes from the blog post: >We’re taking a steady approach to opening up the mobile extension ecosystem to ensure Firefox for Android maintains strong performance standards while a vast new array of extensions are utilized for the first time in a mobile environment. If testing continues to progress well, we anticipate unveiling a fully open Firefox for Android extension ecosystem sometime in December. >We anticipate strong interest from users excited to explore all the new ways they can customize Firefox for Android. Current trends indicate we’ll have at least 200+ new Firefox for Android extensions on AMO when open availability debuts in December. And while a couple hundred extensions is more variety than you’ll find on any other mobile browser, it is significantly fewer than the nearly 40,000 desktop Firefox extensions on AMO. So the opportunity for heightened discoverability with new users may be intriguing to some developers.

>"We can confirm that Galaxy A35 5G will be coming to the US market and look forward to sharing more details in the coming weeks. While we will not be carrying Galaxy A55 5G at this time, consumers can still take advantage of our Galaxy innovation at great value with Galaxy S23 and Galaxy S23 FE."

The shield is a great device, but I'm starting to notice some considerable lag at times. Before I factory reset it, is there a good alternative? I have an older Apple TV I'm going to try but I'd prefer to stay Android. Features I'd want are * Android TV * Netflix and Jellyfin support * Powerful / fast * Similar codec support, however only for compatibility. I'm not needing HDR or Atmos etc. Some of my family are deaf so we watch with subtitles and have a simple speaker setup.

Podcini is really great! It modernizes the Antennapod codebase (we wouldnt believe but that is pretty outdated!) and makes it more efficient. > Differing from the forked project, this project is purely Kotlin based, relies on the most recent dependencies, and most importantly has migrated the media player to androidx.media3, and added mechanism of AudioOffloadMode which is supposed to be kind to device battery. Efficiencies are also sought on running the app. App build is also upgraded to target Android 14. After some hiccups at the beginning, it is now in a very good state!

I can access my employer’s local network if I authenticate with a 2fa. They suggest proprietary software, but aegis authenticator (found in fdroid) works fine. The thing is, the phone’s screen is too small and it’s very cumbersome to navigate the screen and to click, it’s so bad I don’t want to use it, because fonts are so small you cannot read anything. It’s like they didn’t even try to optimize the local network for devices. However, if I could emulate this app on an ubuntu based computer, I’d use it. Can it be done?

> A small change to Google Contacts for Android makes explicit the current backup and sync status, while tweaking the account menu.

Rule of Google: if it works, kill it. I know, I know, using Google apps isn't the best, but this was a perfectly good Podcast app with all the features you might want. Apparently they're moving everything over to YouTube Music, where a lot of the features of Google Podcasts aren't implemented yet. I've moved over to an app from F-Droid.

GrapheneOS has really good documentation, I highly recommend you to read it! I will not cite their website as the content may change.

After the last updates the apps started lagging lagging like hell, is there any frontend app? (Preferably Foss)

I like the feeling of holding and using a phone in one hand. I am using a Pixel 5 right now, but it feels a bit too large for me. I know nobody makes phone that small like the iPhone 4S or the Samsung S3 mini anymore, but is there at least a phone smaller than the Pixel 5? Maybe around the size of a iPhone 12/13 mini? EDIT: There is a small Android phone project in development for anyone interested: https://smallandroidphone.com/

I just found my first phone ever and decided to start it up. I found out the password and decided to factory reset it since I’m planning on selling it. However, ever since I resetted it, it has been stuck on the same “Installing applications” screen (see image). I tried the volume up+power button+home button tactic and chose factory reset and then boot system, but it won’t budge. Anybody know how to solve this?

> Almost 8 years after launch, the Files by Google app has now hit the impressive 5 billion download milestone on the Play Store.