Android 7.0 Nougat review: Google tweaks its OS with an eye on the future

 

After nearly six months of beta testing, Android 7.0 Nougat is being pushed out to the most recent Nexus devices from this week. What goodies and new features does Google's latest mobile OS have in store? And how will it change your phone? We've been putting the software to the test since March and here's what we've found.

What you notice first about Nougat is how little there is to notice. Unlike Apple, Google doesn't update its main apps at the same time as its mobile OS, and the Material Design principles introduced in Android 5.0 Lollipop have only been given slight tweaks. Even Google Now gets updated independently of Android these days.

That leaves the system settings, a bunch of under-the-hood tweaks, and a few extras (like emoji) as the main upgrades arriving with the seventh major Android version. Don't expect a massive difference after you've got the new software installed – at least on the surface – but it's well worth having nonetheless.

 

Look and feel

 

The ever-useful Quick Settings pane gets improved and can now be customizedWhat visual flourishes there are, we like. Notifications are now grouped by app and look tidier on screen as well. There are other small touches, like quick info bars on the Settings page: You can see how much battery is left before tapping on the Battery menu, for instance, or what the ringer volume is set to before you go into the Sound menu.

Notifications are easier to respond to as well – drag down on an alert to see quick responses added by the developer (you can reply in Hangouts and Archive in Gmail for example). There's a new Clear All button at the bottom if you want to dismiss the whole stack of notifications at once. Much as we like iOS as well, it feels like Android has notifications figured out better at the moment.

There are a few small improvements like this, such as the fluid way the Quick Settings pane expands when you pull it down from the top. For the first time you can edit this pane yourself without any third-party apps or hidden system tweaks (or using customized versions of Android, like Samsung's), so you can choose which icons are shown and how they're arranged on screen.

Notifications are grouped by app and take up more space to fit together better on screen 

Bear in mind we've been using the beta versions of Android 7.0 Nougat, and in most cases before any apps have been upgraded to match it, but even so the mobile OS has been a breeze to use on our Nexus 6, particular in the recent builds. Whatever Google is doing to make animations and actions snappier, it's working.

One of the most notable new features is support for a split-screen view, accessed from the Overview (app switching) screen. It's going to be most useful for those on Android tablets, but even on the Nexus 6 it occasionally comes in handy: keeping two websites open at once, say, or making notes from an incoming message.

A double-tap on the Overview/Recent Apps button switches back to your most recent app in Nougat, so flicking between two apps (the one you're using and the one you just left) is easier. It's another example of the small tweaks in Nougat that you're going to enjoy discovering, once the update finally lands on your phone.