Google rolled out the Android 16 Beta 1 update earlier in January. At the time, the search engine giant announced that Android 16 would bring a new feature called “Live Updates” or “Live Notifications”. The company recently released the Android 16 Beta 2 update. However, it hasn’t delivered the “Live Notifications” feature in Android 16. But, a new demo app has made it possible to see how this functionality will work and look like.
A video shows how Android 16’s Live Notifications features will work in several apps
Last month, Viktor Mykhailiv, a software developer, made a demo app for Android 16’s upcoming Live Updates feature. Mishaal Rahmaan of Android Authority used the same demo app to create a progress-centric notification and has shared a video of how this feature will work. Rahman had to modify the application to set the notifications as ongoing, which is a prerequisite for the Live Updates feature.
As you can see in the video below, the new Android 16 “setShortCriticalText API” allows applications to specify the text to show in the status bar chip for Live Notifications. You can see what these Live Updates look like in the status bar, notifications panel, and on the always-on display. Once a chip in the status bar showcases a Live Update, it hides other notification icons. If you tap the chip on the status bar, a full notification in a heads-up pop-up appears below the status bar.
The “Live Notifications” feature of Android 16 will let you check the status of your flight, food, and more
It’s worth mentioning that the Live Notification functionality was first started on smartphones by Apple’s Dynamic Island on iPhone screens. Like the “Live Activities” feature on iOS, the upcoming Android 16 feature will let you check the status of your flight, food, or cab or even show upcoming or ongoing events in the status bar.
App developers will be able to use the new notification style to share updates of ongoing notifications for their applications. We expect that Google will enable this feature in one of the upcoming Android 16 beta updates soon.
