Android 12: Notifications in landscape orientation become less intrusive

Smartphones are used less and less for making calls. What are the most common areas of use? Texting and social networking, of course. Consulting sites. All kinds of applications. Do not listen to music. Watching videos. Even play video games. This last use is far from being in the minority. According to SELL (Entertainment Software Publishers Union), 71% of French people aged 10 and over play games.

Videos and games are two uses that have a lot in common. One of them is the tendency to rotate the smartphone horizontally to enjoy a more immersive experience. Smartphone manufacturers are increasingly responding to the horizontal trend by adapting their Android interfaces for landscape use. Lenovo is a good example of this with its Legion Duel: Legion UI includes 100% landscape mode.

With Android 12, horizontality will no longer be managed at the interface level, but at the operating system level. Most of Android’s graphics will be usable in both directions. Notifications will also be a part of this; The fourth beta version of Android 12 will also include information revealed and communicated to developers. 9to5Google The image below comes from here. You’ll find some additional catches by following the source link.

Android 12 handles notifications better horizontally

The new notification format clearly responds to Material You: colors that change depending on the interface, a round format with a hierarchy, the possibility of creating an independent window, etc. The new thing here is width of notification : is much weaker. So it’s no longer a strip that runs the entire width of the screen, but a more restrained rectangle.

This new format has two consequences. First this notification has low intrusion. It now hides only a small portion of the content. It also integrates better with all graphical elements. The second conclusion is quite negative because it seems that some quick actions are no longer accessible. For example, if you receive a message, the number of suggested replies will decrease because there is less space available. With the release of the final version of Android 12 in a few weeks, it remains to be seen whether Google can find the right balance between the two.

Source : 9to5Google