Google is preparing a major overhaul to notifications and Quick Settings in Android 16
Android 16 could make accessing your Quick Settings more annoying.
JoriPress
- Google is working on a significant revamp of Android’s notification and Quick Settings panels for Android 16.
- The new design for both panels doesn’t take up the entire screen, which is nice.
- However, accessing the Quick Settings panel now requires swiping down with two fingers, which could be controversial.
Google just released the source code of Android 15 the other day, giving developers the opportunity to peek behind the curtains to see how all the new platform features work. Not every feature that Google worked on this past year was completed in time for Android 15’s release, which means we won’t see those changes until one of the upcoming quarterly platform releases or next year’s Android 16 update at the earliest. One of those changes is a total redesign of Android’s notification and Quick Settings panels.
The current design for Android’s notification and Quick Settings panels debuted in 2021’s Android 12 update, which is when Google introduced its Material You design language. In the current layout, the notification and Quick Settings panels are unified. Pulling down the status bar once shows the first four Quick Settings tiles as well as the entire notifications panel. Pulling it down again shows the entire Quick Settings panel plus a few notifications. This is how Android — at least the stock version of it as seen in AOSP — has handled notifications and Quick Settings for years now.
