Gingerbread is officially dead as it loses Google Play Services support

Android Gingerbread and Android Honeycomb are over six years old — in fact, Android Honeycomb turns 7 next week — and they are finally losing support from the Google Play Services framework. Google Developers announced back in November that 10.0 would be the last SDK version to support to support them, and with this week's Google Play Services 10.2, they have officially been left behind.

What does this mean?

Well, the apps that Gingerbread users already have will still be there for them, but once developers start using the newest SDK and targeting Ice Cream Sandwich as the minimum API level, developers have to start building multiple APKs for their app in order to support the older devices or drop support for these really, really old versions of Android that is only being used by about 1% of the Android market.

Don't expect to see the app compatibility for Gingerbread drop off a cliff overnight, but as more and more developers migrate to the 10.2 SDK and beyond, you will start to see things dry up over the coming months. And considering that Gingerbread is old enough to be in grade school, it's time to upgrade to something a little newer.

Ara Wagoner was a staff writer at Android Central. She themes phones and pokes YouTube Music with a stick. When she's not writing about cases, Chromebooks, or customization, she's wandering around Walt Disney World. If you see her without headphones, RUN. You can follow her on Twitter at @arawagco.