Android 17 Beta is Already Here for Pixel Phones to Test (Updated)

After a brief tease yesterday afternoon, Google has gone and done it – Android 17 is already here for Pixel phones. Google announced this morning that Android 17 Beta 1 will arrive as an over-the-air update in the Android Beta Program and as images in Android Studio for developers who don’t own a Pixel.

You may be thinking that this seems super early or that it’s odd that we aren’t getting a Developer Preview build first. Well, it is different in that we are no longer getting developer preview builds. Google launched the Android Canary track last year and is using that as a developer preview going forward, allowing you to get these new beta builds earlier than ever.

As for timing, Google announced at the end of 2024 that Android releases would change. For 2025, Google switched to a 2-release Android track, with the first and biggest Android 16 release going stable by mid-year, followed by a secondary Android 16 release before the end of the year. The same schedule will apply for Android 17. The first release has kicked off now and will go stable pretty quickly, with a planned Platform Stability release at some point in March. There will then be a minor SDK release in Q4 of this year, just like they did with Android 16 last year.

OK, with that out of the way, today does mark the release of the first Android 17 Beta!

As for what’s new in Android 17, we’ll have a separate post shortly that will dive into all of the fun new stuff you might find with Android 17 on your own device. At this point, though, Google has only shared the developer-facing changes that developers need to be aware of. Things like screen resizability restrictions are here for apps to work on all devices, there are several performance improvements (like a new garbage collection and notification restrictions), more professional-grade camera tools and media experiences, and a new print dialog for better usability.

To get started, you can enroll in the Android Beta Program (here) now to get Android 17 on your Pixel device right away. Developers will find system images (here) too.

• UPDATE 11:08AM: Google just reached out to say that there is a change and they will not be releasing this today. They have switched to a “coming soon” release time frame. We’ll let you know once it arrives.

// Android Developers