Newsletter
Google has released the third beta for Android 15, which means that it has hit platform stability, and all app behaviors are finalized. There is one more beta before the stable release – which is expected at some point after August. So there’s not a whole lot of changes in Android 15 Beta 3. Or is there?
Mishaal Rahman, who’s pretty well-known in the Android community for digging through code and finding some new features and changes within Android, has put together a pretty detailed list of changes over on Reddit.
In this beta, there are plenty of behind-the-scenes changes for Android 15. The first one relates to it hitting platform stability. This means that the “Android version” is no longer listed as “VanillaIceCream” but instead listed as “15”. The SDK version is also set to 35 now.
New “Home Controls” screen saver debuts in Android 15 Beta 3
One of the bigger new features in Android 15 Beta 3 is going to be the new “Home Controls” screen saver. It’s exactly what it sounds like, too. Basically, it’s a new screen saver (which used to be called “Daydream”) that will surface your smart home controls for lights, thermostats, plugs, etc. It’s a pretty cool feature to have if you have loads of smart home products in your home.
It also brings in some new changes to Circle to Search, which now works with both taskbar styles. Essentially, it is both transient and persistent on the Pixel Fold and Pixel Tablet.
Android 15 Beta 3 will also now automatically delete your face or fingerprint unlock if they aren’t working well. It will then prompt you to set them up again. So, instead of continuing to fuss with your biometric unlocking and why it’s not working, your phone can intelligently fix it for you.
Google is finally changing Android 15 Beta 3, which will stop treating 7.5W chargers as “fast” because they aren’t. Thanks to this small change, Android 15 will be able to determine a charger as “fast” if it is 20W or faster. That threshold does determine whether the “charging rapidly” text is shown on the lock screen or not.
A small tweak has been applied to the screenshot overlay UI. Now, the screenshot preview sits above the buttons instead of in line with them.
Google’s working on a “Creative Assistant” app
Surfacing in Android 15 Beta 3 is a new “Creative Assistant” app that Google is working on. It is speculated that generative AI will be used to create custom stickers or photos, such as what Apple is doing with Genmoji in Apple Intelligence.
Android 15 Beta 3 also added the “show long app names” toggle. This will allow the user to decide whether the home screen and app list show a truncated name for longer app names or the full name.
Google has also brought up the toggle for Circle to Search one page. So now it can be found under Settings > System > Navigation Mode.
Android’s wallpaper picker UI has also been tweaked in Android 15 Beta 3, making it more evident that you can zoom in or pan on the image.
The Adaptive Timeout feature that we first reported on back in April is finally here in Beta 3. This “automatically turns off your screen if you’re not using your device.” It appears that Adaptive Timeout will use the proximity sensor to see if you’re actually looking at your phone.
Finally, Google is planning to reorganize the settings app in Android 15. There’s a new code in Beta 3 that reveals how the top-level settings page will organize the entries. It’ll also look better with a more Material You design. A few settings have also been renamed, including Device & app notifications to Notification read, reply & control.