Microsoft
Home windows 11 shipped without the promised support for Android apps from the Amazon App Retailer, however Microsoft has introduced the first preview of the characteristic for Home windows Insiders within the Home windows 11 Beta channel right this moment.
The preliminary preview is barely obtainable to customers in the US, and it still isn’t live as of this writing, regardless of Microsoft’s weblog put up. (Replace: It is live now. Microsoft notes that you could be have to allow virtualization options in your PC to get the apps working.) The preview will present entry to 50 Android apps, together with video games, academic apps, and the Kindle app. Microsoft will launch new apps to Home windows Insiders on its favourite timeline: “within the coming months.”
Android apps working on Home windows 11 will not look or really feel like native Home windows apps, however they’ll assist fundamental integration with the remainder of the working system, together with entry to the Motion Middle for notifications and the Clipboard. Microsoft additionally says that “many Home windows accessibility settings apply to Android apps,” but it surely did not specify which.
The official system requirements for running Android apps are barely larger than the already restrictive necessities for working Home windows 11 within the first place. For starters, your PC will want 8GB of RAM as an alternative of the essential 4GB and an SSD as an alternative of a spinning onerous drive. There’s additionally a processor requirement: an Eighth-generation Intel Core i3 processor or newer, an AMD Ryzen 3000-series processor or newer, or the Qualcomm Snapdragon chips that energy the small handful of ARM Home windows units. This seems to exclude Ryzen 2000-series chips and a few slower Celeron and Pentium chips, although it isn’t clear how or whether or not Microsoft shall be imposing these additional necessities.
We have written about a number of the underpinnings of the “Home windows Subsystem for Android” and the Intel Bridge Expertise that works behind the scenes to get ARM Android apps working on x86-based Intel and AMD PCs. We’ll revisit the characteristic once more because it will get nearer to a public launch.
Itemizing picture by Ron Amadeo
