Android 8.0 (Oreo) has been released on the Pixel 2 (and will come on other devices). There has been a big change ‘behind the scenes’ to the architecture to use the same version across different devices. However there is a change that directly affects the display and that is colour management, which is now implemented on the new Pixel 2. Previously, there was no colour management on Android – the colours seen by the user depended just on the decisions of the smartphone maker and the display used, so that, for example, OLEDs looked very different from LCDs. That is a contrast with Apple, which, as pointed out by Ray Soneira of DisplayMate, has carefully managed display colour to ensure consistency across its devices.
At the moment, the colour management is not a default process, apps will have to set a flag to enable the function. That means that the basic user interface is not yet colour managed, although, eventually, we would expect this level of control to be introduced.
Smartphone makers will be able to set a colour profile based on the display used in smartphones.
Analyst Comment
In celebration, the makers of Oreos made the special cookies on the right! (BR)
