The Android 1.0 house display and its rudimentary internet browser (not yet called Chrome). Cupcake additionally brought in regards to the framework for third-occasion app widgets, which might shortly flip into one in every of Android’s most distinguishing elements, and it supplied the platform’s first-ever option for video recording. Cupcake introduced numerous refinements to the Android interface, together with the first on-screen keyboard – something that’d be obligatory as telephones moved away from the once-ubiquitous bodily keyboard model. With early 2009’s Android 1.5 Cupcake release, the tradition of Android model names was born.

It gave us expandable and interactive notifications, an expanded voice search system, and a more superior system for displaying search results in general, with a concentrate on card-primarily based outcomes that tried to answer questions immediately. Jelly Bean ushered in a heavily hyped system for placing widgets in your lock screen, too – one that, like so many Android options over the years, quietly disappeared a couple years later. Jelly Bean’s Quick Settings panel and brief-lived lock screen widget characteristic. Multiuser assist also got here into play, albeit on tablets solely at this point, and an early model of Android’s Fast Settings panel made its first appearance. Lighter backgrounds and more neutral highlights took their locations, with a clear standing bar and white icons giving the OS a more contemporary appearance. Late-2013’s KitKat release marked the top of Android’s darkish era, because the blacks of Gingerbread and the blues of Honeycomb finally made their way out of the working system.

It was easy being green again within the Gingerbread days.

Android’s first true visible id started coming into focus with 2010’s Gingerbread release. Black and inexperienced seeped everywhere in the UI as Android began its gradual march towards distinctive design. Android 3.0 came into the world as a pill-solely launch to accompany the launch of the Motorola Xoom, and through the next 3.1 and 3.2 updates, it remained a pill-exclusive (and closed-supply) entity. 2011’s Honeycomb interval was a bizarre time for Android. It was easy being green again within the Gingerbread days. Brilliant green had long been the coloration of Android’s robot mascot, and with Gingerbread, it turned an integral part of the operating system’s appearance. Underneath the steering of newly arrived design chief Matias Duarte, Honeycomb introduced a dramatically reimagined UI for Android.

It had a space-like “holographic” design that traded the platform’s trademark inexperienced for blue and placed an emphasis on taking advantage of a tablet’s screen house. With Honeycomb appearing as the bridge from outdated to new, Ice Cream Sandwich – also launched in 2011 – served as the platform’s official entry into the era of fashionable design. While the idea of a tablet-specific interface didn’t last long, many of Honeycomb’s ideas laid the groundwork for the Android we know immediately. Honeycomb: When Android obtained a case of the holographic blues.

The discharge refined the visible concepts introduced with Honeycomb and reunited tablets and phones with a single, unified UI vision. The ICS dwelling display and app-switching interface. And it began the gradual process of bringing a standardized design framework – often called “Holo” – all throughout the OS and into Android’s app ecosystem. ICS dropped a lot of Honeycomb’s “holographic” appearance but kept its use of blue as a system-wide highlight. Android 4.Zero additionally made swiping a extra integral technique of getting around the operating system, with the then-revolutionary-feeling capability to swipe away issues like notifications and recent apps. And it carried over core system elements like on-display screen buttons and a card-like appearance for app-switching.