Google has announced a significant change to the publication schedule for the Android Open Source Project (AOSP). Starting this year, the source code repository will receive updates only twice annually, during the second and fourth quarters. Previously, there were quarterly code releases.
A New Branch for Developers
Developers who previously relied on the continuously updated "aosp-main" branch should now use the new "android-latest-release" branch. This branch reflects the state of the most recent Android release, such as "android16-qpr2-release" at the time of writing.
Monthly security patches will continue to appear as scheduled in the "android-security" branches. These updates address vulnerabilities and will not be impacted by the new biannual release cadence.
By changing the release schedule, Google is trying to align AOSP with a trunk-stable development model. This will simplify Android development, reduce the overhead of maintaining multiple branches, and deliver more stable and secure code to third-party developers.
Previously, the coexistence of internal and public branches led to growing discrepancies throughout each release cycle. This required considerable effort to synchronize changes and merge patches across different branches.
Last year, Google stopped the inclusion of Pixel-specific modifications in AOSP and began developing new releases entirely behind closed doors. Earlier, Android followed a hybrid development model. Certain components, such as the Bluetooth stack, build system, update engine, and virtualization framework, have got a lot of publicly available improvements while others remained internal until final release.
Under the current model, all development occurs within an internal branch. The new code will appear in the AOSP repository only in conjunction with official Android releases.
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