Android 15: edge-to-edge, private space

Android 15 is the release where edge-to-edge stopped being optional. Apps targeting API 35 draw behind the status and navigation bars by default, and long-running dataSync foreground services get a daily time limit. For users it brought the private space, a locked area that hides apps from the rest of the phone.

At a glance

The first developer preview came out on 16 February 2024. A second preview and four betas followed, and Beta 3 reached platform stability on 18 June 2024. Each milestone is a part below this overview. On 3 September 2024 Google published the Android 15 source to AOSP before any Pixel got the update, which broke the usual pattern of releasing both on the same day. Android 12 was the last release to split them. The tag android-15.0.0_r1 is dated 5 September. The Pixel rollout started on 15 October 2024 for the Pixel 6 and later, the Pixel Fold and the Pixel Tablet.

The Pixel 9 phones, launched in August 2024, ran Android 14 out of the box. The first Pixel sold with Android 15 was the Pixel 9a. Google’s announcement also named Samsung, Honor, Lenovo, Motorola, Nothing, OnePlus, Oppo, Sony, vivo and Xiaomi among the makers that would ship the update in the following months.

The codename Vanilla Ice Cream was never used in marketing, but it is the SDK constant, and AOSP documents it in one line: Vanilla Ice Cream. It surfaced in AOSP code changes long before release, as Android Authority reported.

What it brought

• Private space. A separate, locked area for sensitive apps. Its apps sit in their own launcher container, and while it is locked they disappear from recents, notifications, settings and other apps. It can use the device lock or its own, and can hold a separate Google account.
• App archiving. PackageInstaller.requestArchive() removes an app’s APK and cache but keeps its data; requestUnarchive() restores it. On Pixel, users can also archive an app from App info.
• App screen sharing. A user can share or record a single app window instead of the whole screen. It first appeared in Android 14 QPR2; Android 15 adds MediaProjection callbacks to adapt the experience.
• PDF. PdfRenderer opens password-protected files and supports annotations, form editing (FormEditRecord), text search (Page.searchText()) and selection with copy. PdfRendererPreV brings the same API to Android 11 and later.
• Satellite. ServiceState.isUsingNonTerrestrialNetwork() tells an app the device is on a satellite network. SMS, MMS and preloaded RCS apps can send and receive messages over it.
• Camera. Low Light Boost brightens the preview in the dark, and FLASH_SINGLE_STRENGTH_DEFAULT_LEVEL and FLASH_TORCH_STRENGTH_DEFAULT_LEVEL give apps control over flash strength.
• Audio and video. LoudnessCodecController applies the CTA-2075 loudness standard to AAC content that carries loudness metadata. The dav1d AV1 software decoder is available as c2.android.av1-dav1d.decoder on devices without hardware AV1 decoding; apps opt in by name, and Google Play system updates bring it back to Android 11.
• Tap to pay. On supported devices, NfcAdapter observe mode lets the device listen to a reader without answering, so a payment app can prepare before the first exchange. A new Wallet role replaces the default contactless payment setting.
• Performance tools. ApplicationStartInfo reports cold, warm or hot starts and why the app started. ProfilingManager takes heap dumps and stack samples from inside the app. StorageStats.getAppBytesByDataType() breaks app size down by APK, AOT code and libraries.
• Platform libraries. OpenJDK 17 APIs such as SequencedCollection, which Google Play system updates also deliver to Android 12 and later. SQLite 3.44.3 with read-only deferred transactions. Canvas.clipShader() and Matrix44.
• Large screens. Saved split-screen app pairs and a taskbar the user can pin.
• Widget previews. AppWidgetManager.setWidgetPreview() lets an app send generated RemoteViews as its picker preview, instead of a static image that rarely matched the real widget.

Security and privacy

• Theft protection, in two parts. Android 15 itself requires the PIN, password or biometric to change sensitive settings such as Find My Device, locks the device after repeated failed unlock attempts, and strengthens factory reset protection. Theft Detection Lock, Offline Device Lock and Remote Lock are different: they arrived through a Google Play services update on most Android 10+ devices, not through Android 15.
• Hidden OTPs. Untrusted notification listeners can no longer read notifications in which the system detected a one-time password. Trusted ones, such as companion device apps, are exempt.
• Screen sharing protection. During screen sharing, notification content and password fields are hidden from the remote viewer. Apps can mark a view sensitive with setContentSensitivity.
• Screen recording detection. WindowManager.addScreenRecordingCallback() tells an app when it is being recorded.
• Insecure mobile networks. New settings warn users when the connection is not encrypted or when the network asks for identifiers like the IMSI in a way that could track them. Carriers can no longer hide the 2G toggle.
• Credential Manager. Apps can link username and password fields to a Credential Manager request, so its suggestions appear in autofill. Credential Manager also runs the biometric prompt itself during sign-up and sign-in, so providers no longer build their own.
• Contact keys. E2eeContactKeysManager stores contacts’ public keys at the OS level for end-to-end encrypted apps, and lets users verify them from the contacts app.
• Platform. Signature permissions requested by non-system apps go through an explicit allowlist. Virtual A/B version 3 makes updates smaller and faster.

Permissions

No runtime permission was added or changed. The new permissions are all normal ones, granted at install:

• FOREGROUND_SERVICE_MEDIA_PROCESSING, needed to run a foreground service of the new mediaProcessing type.
• ACCESS_HIDDEN_PROFILES, which a launcher declares to show the private space. It also has to hold the home role.
• DETECT_SCREEN_RECORDING, needed for the screen recording callback.

Photo access, which Android 14 made partial with READ_MEDIA_VISUAL_USER_SELECTED, gains MediaStore.QUERY_ARG_LATEST_SELECTION_ONLY so an app can query only the photos the user picked last. See Android 14 for how partial access works.

What changed for your app

All apps on Android 15

Apps targeting API 35

The edge-to-edge change is the one most apps noticed. Bars become transparent (three-button navigation keeps an 80% scrim), and anything not padded by insets slides under them: top app bars, floating action buttons, the last list item. Apps could still opt out for API 35 with windowOptOutEdgeToEdgeEnforcement while they fixed their screens.

The new mediaProcessing type, meant for jobs like transcoding, has the same six-hour budget as dataSync:

Since List.removeFirst() and removeLast() now resolve to the new SequencedCollection methods when compiling against API 35, code with a lower minSdk crashes with NoSuchMethodError on Android 14 and older. Lint’s NewApi check flags it; removeAt(0) avoids it.

What lasted

• Edge-to-edge became mandatory. For apps targeting Android 16, windowOptOutEdgeToEdgeEnforcement is deprecated and ignored.
• Predictive back went further. Apps targeting Android 16 get the system animations by default, and onBackPressed is no longer called.
• elegantTextHeight, defaulted here, is deprecated in Android 16 and ignored for apps targeting it.
• 16 KB pages became a Play rule. From 1 November 2025, new apps and updates targeting Android 15 or higher had to support 16 KB pages on 64-bit devices. The current page sets 1 February 2027 as the date from which non-compliant updates are refused. Android 16 added a compatibility mode for some 4 KB apps.
• Private space, app archiving and the foreground service time limits are unchanged.

Worth knowing

• The Easter egg is Landroid, the space game from Android 14. Holding the Android 15 logo charges a starfield warp for five seconds, with the phone rumbling, before the game opens.
• New in Android 15, the game also runs as a screen saver once unlocked. Its description in AOSP is ---- AUTOPILOT ENGAGED ----, and the ship flies between planets on its own.
• Google measured 16 KB pages on its own devices: about 3% faster app launch under memory pressure and about 8% (roughly 950 ms) faster boot on average.
• Android 15 introduced the android15-6.6 kernel, on Linux 6.6. It also supports older GKI kernels back to android12-5.10, so an updated phone can keep the kernel it launched with. From this release on, there is only one new GKI kernel per kernel version: there is no android15-6.1.