Summary of what's new in Android 14 Beta 4 (build number UPB4.230623.005)

amihan@lemmy.world to Android@lemmy.ml – 19 points –
Mishaal Rahman (@MishaalRahman@androiddev.social)
androiddev.social

Summary of what's new in Android 14 Beta 4 (build number UPB4.230623.005):

  • Expanded availability to Pixel Fold and Pixel Tablet

  • New Easter egg. To activate the Easter egg, open Settings > About Phone > Android version and repeatedly tap on “Android version” until you see the Android 14 logo floating in space. Hold down on the logo and you’ll see the “stars” speed by.

  • New SystemUI icon

  • New status bar icon for "mute"/"silent" mode

  • "Speech" settings moved from Settings > System > Keyboard to Settings > System > Languages

  • "Auto-confirm unlock" toggle has been added to Settings > Device unlock > Screen lock. This feature unlocks your phone automatically when you enter your PIN correctly. Your PIN must be 6 digits or more to enable this.

  • Under Settings > About phone > Model, you can now see your phone’s “manufactured year”. This is derived from your device's serial number.

  • The “ring volume” and “notification volume” sliders are now completely separated in Android 14, with no way to merge them again. In older betas, the separation was controlled by a DeviceConfig flag, but that flag’s no longer in use.

  • Lock screen clocks are now enabled on the Pixel 4a 5G, Pixel 5, Pixel 5a 5G, and Pixel Fold, but not the Pixel Tablet.

  • New default profile picture options

  • The Settings app references a new “speed boost” toggle in SIM settings. I’m not sure what it’ll do yet, as it launches an activity in Adaptive Connectivity Services that doesn’t exist yet in Beta 4. Interestingly, the feature is explicitly disabled for Spectrum mobile.

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Correct me if I'm wrong but these seem kind of... worthless. I mean do they really need to call it Android 14? Sounds more like a feature update for Android 13.

These are the features and changes added in Beta 4, specifically. There have been other changes added to the previous three betas.

Still it doesn't seem like much. Mostly cosmetic changes you know.

There are lots of changes under the hood. Even so, Chrome is at like version 1773574 now, because they threw away the concept of version numbers years ago.

Oh. I should have done my research then. I apologize for my ignorance.