Whether you have privacy concerns or you just want to freely tinker, these are our favorite alternatives to stock Android.

From swirling updates to confusing convergence and more than a few wacky experiments, 2026 is looking to be anything but uneventful for Google's Android platform. It’s hard to believe, but here we be ...

Google makes one big Android release a year — until now. This week, it released Android 16 QPR2. In some ways it’s a minor update, but one that means there should be greater flexibility and, therefore ...

What just happened? Android's annual major releases have gone the same way as its dessert-themed names. The current Android 16 QPR2 rollout marks the end of a single big update to the operating system ...

With the December 2025 security patch, Google is rolling out the stable Android 16 QPR2 update for the Pixel 6, 6 Pro, 6a, 7, 7 Pro, 7a, Tablet, Fold, 8, 8 Pro, 8a, 9, 9 Pro, 9 Pro XL, 9 Pro Fold, ...

Google announced on Tuesday that it is releasing a slew of Android 16 updates, along with new general Android and accessibility features. The rollout of the new Android 16 features, which are first ...

Switching up the release schedule could bring new features to third-party Android phones much faster. Switching up the release schedule could bring new features to third-party Android phones much ...

OpenAI on Tuesday launched its Sora app of AI-generated videos for Android devices. The announcement on Tuesday brings the popular AI app to the Google Play app store for users in the U.S., Canada, ...

Android updates have gotten tricky to keep track of these days — between the polar-opposite problems of unpredictably poky progress from most non-Google device-makers and perplexingly overlapping ...

Google's Rick Osterloh at Made By Google 2024 (Credit: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images) Don't miss out on our latest stories. Add PCMag as a preferred source on Google. UPDATE: Google ...

Google will restrict sideloading with developer verification. The move mirrors Apple's long-standing security approach. Android loses one of its last big differences from iOS. For years, one of the ...

is a reviewer covering laptops and the occasional gadget. He spent over 15 years in the photography industry before joining The Verge as a deals writer in 2021. Android has an enormous app ecosystem, ...