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| Android 6 Marshmallow Logo |
Whether you like them straight out of the bag, roasted to a golden brown exterior with a molten center, or in
fluff form, who doesn’t like marshmallows? We definitely like them! Since the launch of the M Developer Preview at Google I/O in May, we’ve enjoyed all of your participation and feedback. Today with the final Developer Preview update, we're introducing the official Android 6.0 SDK and opening Google Play for publishing your apps that target the new API level 23 in Android Marshmallow.
Get your apps ready for Android MarshmallowThe final
Android 6.0 SDK is now available to download via the SDK Manager in
Android Studio. With the
Android 6.0 SDK you have access to the final Android APIs and the latest build tools so that you can target API 23. Once you have downloaded the Android 6.0 SDK into Android Studio, update your app project compileSdkVersion to 23 and you are ready to test your app with the new platform. You can also update your app to targetSdkVersion to 23 test out API 23 specific features
like auto-backup and app permissions.Along with the
Android 6.0 SDK, we also updated the
Android Support Library to v23. The new Android Support library makes it easier to integrate many of the new platform APIs, such as permissions and fingerprint support, in a backwards-compatible manner. This release contains a number of new support libraries including: customtabs, percent, recommendation, preference-v7, preference-v14, and preference-leanback-v17.
Check your App PermissionsAlong with the
new platform features like fingerprint support and Doze power saving mode, Android Marshmallow features a
new permissions model that streamlines the app install and update process. To give users this flexibility and to make sure your app behaves as expected when an Android Marshmallow user disables a specific permission, it’s important that you update your app to target API 23, and test the app thoroughly with Android Marshmallow users.
How to Get the UpdateThe Android emulator system images and developer preview system images have been updated for supported Nexus devices (Nexus 5, Nexus 6, Nexus 9 & Nexus Player) to help with your testing. You can download the device system images from the
developer preview site. Also, similar to the previous developer update, supported Nexus devices will receive an Over-the-Air (OTA) update over
The next couple days.
Although the
Android 6.0 SDK is final, the devices system images are still developer preview versions. The preview images are near final but they are not intended for consumer use. Remember that when
Android 6.0 Marshmallow launches to the public later this fall, you'll need to manually re-flash your device to a
factory image to continue to receive consumer OTA updates for your Nexus device.
What is New in Android 6.0 MarshmallowCompared to the previous developer preview update, you will find this final API update fairly incremental. You can check out all the API differences
here, but a few of the changes since the last developer update include:
Android Platform Change:
Final Permissions User Interface — we updated the permissions user interface and enhanced some of the permissions behavior.
API Change:
Updates to the Fingerprint API — which enables better error reporting, better fingerprint enrollment experience, plus enumeration support for greater reliability.
Upload your Android Marshmallow apps to Google PlayGoogle Play is now ready to accept your API 23 apps via the Google Play Developer Console on all release channels (Alpha, Beta & Production). At the consumer launch this fall, the Google Play store will also be updated so that the app install and update process supports the new permissions model for apps using API 23.
To make sure that your updated app runs well on Android Marshmallow and older versions, we recommend that you use Google Play’s
newly improved beta testing feature to get early feedback, then do a staged rollout as you release the new version to all users.