Android P Beta 3 or Android P Developers Preview 4 has been officially released for Google Pixel devices and it is now available for users to download. For other partner devices, the smartphone users will have to wait for few days or weeks to get Beta 3 update which is touted as the closest version towards the final stable release expected to be made in August 2018. As per the reports, Google released the Beta 3 version today on July 2 that focuses mainly on fixing the bugs discovered and reported earlier after the Beta 2 was released and also, it provides optimizations for the stability of the OS on the devices.
Although there aren’t any major changes as seen in the latest beta update, however, it will include all the features of Android P along with fixes for bugs and lot more. If you have signed up for Android Beta Program i.e. for Google Pixel devices, you’ll soon get the update via OTA or you can flash the images of Beta 3 version by yourself. However, for other smartphone partners, the update will be sent via OTA in coming weeks.
The new Android P DP 4 aka beta 3 version has few minor changes such as the theme of the app drawer and the notification tray as well as other interfaces that were earlier based on the wallpaper i.e. either dark or light, the user can choose between light or dark by themselves. Furthermore, we already know that Android P will have different icons and color scheme, the DP 4 showed that most of the icons are now outlined icons and not filled icons that were earlier used. It looks neat and tidy as these icons are well-designed and located as per convenience.
The update also includes a new volume setting for calls that the user can tweak in order to change the call volumes. Earlier, users had to attend or call someone to tweak the call volume settings but its now easy to tweak. There are no on-screen buttons available on Android P that were earlier used, however, there is a slider located right in the bottom of the screen that lets the user scroll through recent apps with just a slide. There is a small back button designed as ‘<’ as opposed to previously used triangular ‘back’ on-screen button and it is self-explanatory.
Android P allows the user to set the phone in a landscape mode which is not the case with earlier iterations of Android OSes as they had to force the screen to landscape and then, back to portrait. But with Android P, there is a dedicated on-screen button located on the right bottom of the screen at the notch support that allows changing the orientation of the screen. As a matter of fact, Google stated that this is the more stable and closest to the official Android P version that will be rolled out in August this year but before that, the Developer Preview 5 will be rolled out before the official version hits the market.