Android 12.1 could follow Android 12, and arrive later this year
If Android 12.1 becomes a thing, it wouldn’t be the first time Google released a point update. The company did it back in 2017 with Android 8.1 Oreo. Why is it a possibility? Well, read on. First and foremost, let’s just say that developers got advised by Google to update their apps to target API level 31, which is the framework API that Android 12 will deliver. The API level for Android 11 was 30. For Android 10, it was 29, and so on. You get the point. That being said, it’s safe to assume that API level 32 will represent Android 13, right? Well, it may not. Something interesting got spotted within the AOSP Gerrit (by XDA Developer luca020400). His findings suggest that API level 32 actually corresponds to Android 12 “sc-v2”, and not Android 13 “T”. What’s interesting is that a Googler changes the API level that a new NDK API will be first made available in from 32 to 33. On the flip side, there are currently no planned NDK APIs in scv2-dev. This would suggest that API level 33 corresponds to Android 13 T, which is actually two API levels above the one that corresponds to the current OS release, Android 12 (API level 31). As you can see, we’re missing one step here, and the “sc-v2” could tip a point update. The “sc” part in that name refers to “snow cone”, in case you were wondering. That is the rumored dessert code-name for Android 12.
If that version does arrive, it likely won’t bring any major changes
So, if Android 12.1 does get released, that will likely happen later this year. It won’t exactly replace Android 13 next year, but it could bring some new features / changes to the table, but no major changes. We’ll have to wait and see.
