Plenty of us have gotten in on the Android P Beta fun already, but Google has released yet another update to improve stability and fix bugs in the yet-to-be-named new Android release. Android P Beta 3 is now available for Google's own Pixel devices through the Android Beta Program, which will push out over-the-air updates to anyone who has enrolled or enrolls now. If you have one of the many phones from other manufacturers — like Vivo, Essential, OnePlus and Xiaomi — you'll have to wait for a little bit to get your update; Google says they'll be pushing out the latest version "in the coming weeks."
So what's in this update? Well as you can imagine at this point, things haven't changed dramatically from Beta 2. Installing the new software you'll see very subtle iconography changes throughout the system including the status bar, notification shade and setting screen. The back button is also now a thinner little arrow (but functions the exact same), and the scrub bar area when using the gesture navigation button is nearly the full width of the screen.
Google has already finalized all of the APIs in Android P, which is important for developers who are making their apps compatible with the latest version. (For the developers out there, Beta 3 is analogous to Developer Preview 4.) Google says Beta 3 is focused on "stability and polish," as well as getting the latest July security patch out to phones running on the Beta software. Google says that the system is "near-final" and is labeling it as a "release candidate build" — so what we see here shouldn't be far off from what's finally unveiled as the official version.
If you're clamoring to get Android P on your own phone, there are several ways to do it — the easiest is to simply wait a few hours and receive an OTA update. But you can also download and install the software manually if you wish — we have full instructions on how to do so.
Andrew was an Executive Editor, U.S. at Android Central between 2012 and 2020.
