Google is postponing the public beta launch of Android 11 indefinitely. According to Google, Android 11 will still be released in the fall.
In a message on Android’s Twitter channel, Google announced that the launch will not take place. “We are excited to tell you more about Android 11, but now is not the time to celebrate.” Although there is no exact reason given, it seems to be a reaction to the large-scale protests in the United States. The reason for these protests is the police brutality against black people after George Floyd was killed during his arrest last week.
The launch of the public beta was first planned in early May, but the coronavirus forced Google to change the date to the 3rd of June. The expectation is that Android 11 will be released this fall according to schedule.
Android 11 features
Google already released a developer preview for the new Android version earlier this year, and as a result, many new features are already known such as a new bubbles functionality. This allows chat apps to open bubbles that appear on the side of your phone screen. With this feature, there is no need to open the entire app to send a message. People who use the Facebook Messenger application have been familiar with this functionality for a long time.
Google is also putting more focus on privacy with Android 11. For example, it is possible to give applications temporary permission to use the location or microphone only once. In previous Android versions, applications only needed permission once in order to be able to use the microphone, for example, continuously. Android 11 also features ‘scoped storage’, which means that an application gets its own closed environment where it only has access to relevant data to that specific application and nothing else.