It's another great time of year and Google has released a preview version of Android 12 for developers, which is very exciting as we get to see some of the new features Google has planned for users.

At this point, we don't know what will be the final release, but Google has plenty to share in the meantime. Unless you are a developer or hardcore Android fan, this Developer Preview is not for you. It's not fully stable yet and may break the normal functionality of your device. We and Google urge you to temper your excitement and wait for a future version.

That said, this first release is aimed at developers and will help them prepare their apps. Most of the additional features here are focused on this aspect. With that out of the way, let's dig into the new features of Android 12.

In Google's announcement blog post, Dave Burke, the company's VP of Engineering, tackles the new features of Android 12. Much of it is developer-oriented, so some may find it a bit tedious. We can't get around that, but we did pick out a few things worth noting.

Compatible media transcoding: Android 12 will support automatic transcoding of media to higher quality formats. For apps that do not or cannot support the High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) codec used by many modern camera apps, Android 12 will automatically transcode video files to the more popular Advanced Video Coding (AVC) format. There may be a delay on the user's end while the device transcodes the file.

AVIF image support: When a picture is taken, the camera saves it in the common JPEG format (extension .jpg). However, this format is a bit outdated, so Android 12 introduces support for the newer AV1 image file format (AVIF). This format offers higher image quality and more efficient image compression. In some cases, the files look noticeably better than their JPG counterparts, while being of similar, if not smaller, file size.

New Notification UI: From some of the early leaks about Android 12, we saw what could be a new UI centered around notifications and notification shades. Since this is an important part of Android, users will notice the visual changes right away. Currently, the Developer Preview includes updates to make transitions and animations smoother, and there are also some tweaks to the controls and templates. Again, this is interesting from a developer perspective, but these changes will eventually affect users.

More responsive notifications: everyone wants faster notifications. When we tap on a shady item, we expect to jump to that app immediately. But that doesn't always happen. Google wants to change this situation with Android 12, so that apps targeting the new platform will open targeted activities as soon as they are tapped, rather than relying on an intermediate "trampoline" service that runs first. For the end user, this means, in theory, faster and more responsive notifications.

Improved app compatibility testing: This is for developers and we, the users, will not see this directly. But this is important: Android 12 will allow developers to toggle some of the new opt-in features for testing app compatibility. These toggles will allow developers to test what happens when certain features are enabled or disabled.

Platform Stability Milestone: last year, Google made it easier for developers to make their apps compatible with Android 11. The project timeline let developers know when the final SDK, internal APIs, and system behavior would be ready; the Android 12 development cycle will be much the same. Google plans to stabilize Android 12 by August 2021, giving developers considerable time to prepare their apps before the final release.

If you are a developer, or if you intend to ignore the warning that it is not for consumers yet, this is the first device supported in the Developer Preview:

Since this is for developers only for the time being, Google has released Android 12 Developer Preview 1 as a manual download only. You can then flash the image to a Pixel with an unlocked bootloader or sideload the OTA file if you have a locked bootloader. After that, new preview and beta updates will be available via OTA as they become available.

Android 12 Developer Preview images can be downloaded from the Android Developer site.