Google is set to do things very differently with next year’s Android 16, according to two separate reports.
Any Pixel 9 owners currently faced with the annoyance of having to wait months for the accompanying new Android 15 version might find some solace (or just extra annoyance) in the first of those reports. Android Authority is claiming that Google is looking to bring Android 16 forward by a quite significant amount of time next year.
Numerous references have been discovered to a ’25Q2′ release for Android 16. You shouldn’t need to be a code breaker to figure out that this means the second quarter of 2025.
For the past 13 years, every version of Android has released in Q3, while for the past 11 years it’s been arriving no earlier than August. With that in mind, an April, May, or June rollout for the next version would be a huge shift in Google’s schedule from the expected 25Q3.
The source point to Google’s shift to a trunk-based development model earlier this year as one possible reason for this shift. To cut a long (and technical) story short, it has meant that Google has been able to push out updates much more quickly than before.
Android whatnow?
In a separate reveal, Android Authority (via developer teamb58) appears to have discovered that Google is ditching the naming scheme of its mobile OS with Android.
While the days of each new version of Android being accompanied by the high profile reveal of an alphabetically ordered dessert name (starting with Android 1.5’s Cupcake, then Donut, then Eclair and so on) have long passed, Google has continued to stick with this scheme in the background. It refers to Android 15 internally as Vanilla Ice Cream, for example.
Not so for Android 16, apparently. Early code for the 2025 OS contains references to Baklava, the flaky pastry treat commonly made in West Asia and Southeast Europe.
From the sounds of it, Google is skipping those tricky last few letters in the alphabet (at least in dessert terms) and resetting the scheme. Here’s hoping Android 16 doesn’t prove to be as flaky as its codename.
