The following table shows the versions of the Android OS, together with the release date and the current status.
If you are unsure what version of Android is running on your device, you can run the Settings App . Scroll down on the Settings screen and look for an "About phone", "About tablet", or "System" option. You'll usually find this at the very bottom of the main Settings screen, under System, but depending on your device it could be different. If you do find a specific option for System, you can usually find the “About Phone” underneath that. It is also important to note that smartphone manufacturers have their own customised versions of Android, so their release of new versions or updates generally lag behind Google's official releases and may have different release numbers. Moreover, many manufacturers stop updating existing smartphones after 2 or 3 years because older phones are often not able to run later versions, so don't expect your phone to be on the latest version. NOTE: With the release of Android 14, Google announced that support for the Pixel 8 (also announced) with be for seven years - it will be interesting to see whether other manufacturers follow this plan.
Google do not appear to have published a support policy for Android, but they simply announce that a particular version is no longer supported, or that a new version will not be available or supported on older devices. The latest version is generally only available on Google devices when first released, and released to other platforms later. It should be noted that the Android operating system belongs to Google, and while other mobile phone vendors can use Android, they cannot own it. However, each vendor can customise Android using their own User Interfaces which is why Android on different brands has a different look and feel, but the underlying OS is still Android. This sometimes makes it difficult to teach Android because what users see on their phones and tablets is different for each brand. |