There is no doubt that this week's big theme was the surprise launch, much earlier than expected, of the first preview of Android N, which will be the next big update of the mobile operating system of Google, and whose news we have already spoken to you on several occasions. How, however, are all these new features and changes going to affect our user experience? How are we going to notice the most evolution And what are the main reasons why we might want to have this new version on our tablets and smartphones? We review these issues and highlight the 5 big improvements that he is going to leave us.
Multitasking
If there is a section in which our user experience is going to benefit substantially from the arrival of Android N this is, without a doubt, the one of the multitask. The main reason is, of course, the official debut of the multi-window, which, in addition, will not be limited to the possibility of dividing the screen between two applications but will also include the option of putting one of them in a floating window (the functionality that is being called "picture in picture". There is, however, another novelty that has attracted less attention but that can also be the most interesting when we are using several applications at the same time: with a double tap on it. multitasking button, we jump directly to the application in which we were before, and with a touch we can go through all the ones we have open.
Notifications
Another of the great novelties of Android N and that is also giving a lot to talk about are the new possibilities that have been introduced for the use of the tab notifications, along with some minor cosmetic changes. There are basically two and, although they seem trivial, for many they will undoubtedly represent an important gain in comfort when managing them: the first of them is that now we will be able to reply directly from there, without having to open the application in question (as we can do now with hangouts); the second is that we will be able Group the different notifications that we receive per application.
Customization
One of the main virtues of Android, but the main one is obviously the enormous variety of options of customization that it makes available to us, and with the new update it seems that Google will continue to open doors for us: on the one hand, we will now have many more options to customize our quick settings (Thanks to a new button to "edit" and what we are going to see in the status bar; on the other, the "Night mode", although this now not only includes a darker theme, but also a filter to give a warmer tone to the light of the screen and brightness settings for different times of the day; and, finally, we will also have the option to increase or decrease the letter size on all screens.
Autonomy
You have to recognize Google having as one of their priorities to improve as much as possible the autonomy of our devices, since it is a constant in all its major updates to incorporate new optimizations and functions to reduce consumption. The one that leaves us Android N, however, it is not properly a novelty, but a deepening of what it introduced Android Marshmallow: Pickups. How has what Doze already did been improved? Simply, extending its operation to more situations, lowering the requirements for its activation: from now on it will start working when the device screen is off even if it is "on the move", for example, when we carry it in our pocket.
Data consumption
The split screen, new notifications and new settings configuration options are getting a lot of attention when it comes to Android N but, as with the best ones introduced in the Doze function, there is another little function, called Data Saver, which may go unnoticed but can be very useful in our day, particularly when we are trying to reduce as much as possible our data consumption, since this is precisely its objective: by simply activating or deactivating it, we block all the activities that the applications perform in the background and that require connection (or minimize them, if blocking them completely is not possible or advisable), although we do want to rid any of them of these limitations of course we can also do it.
Do you want to try it?
Eager to take a look yourself at Android N and all its news? Well, if you have a Nexus, you can do it now: in this guide we explain how.