The Chinese smartphone manufacturer Oppo has recently announced that the Android 16 Beta 3 update is now available for Oppo Find X8 users globally. Do note that this update is intended for developers and experienced users. Users who are unfamiliar with flashing ROMs, developing software, or relying on their device for daily use should wait for the stable release.
📢 New Beta just dropped! 📢
The Android 16 Beta 3 is ready for OPPO Find X8 users. Find out more 🔗 https://t.co/mohvHcuWN4 pic.twitter.com/PA63c27yXP
— ColorOS (@colorosglobal) May 13, 2025
Android 16 Developer Preview Key Update Points
User Experience
Predictive Back Navigation Updates
In Android 16, developers can enable predictive back system animations in gesture navigation, such as the “return to home screen” animation. By using the new PRIORITY_SYSTEM_NAVIGATION_OBSERVER to register onBackInvokedCallback, your application can receive regular onBackInvoked calls while the system processes back navigation, without affecting the normal back navigation flow. Android 16 also adds finishAndRemoveTaskCallback() and moveTaskToBackCallback. By registering these callbacks with OnBackInvokedDispatcher, the system can trigger specific behaviors and play corresponding preview animations when invoking back gestures.
Progress Centric Notification
Android 16 introduces progress-centric notification features to help users seamlessly track entire end-to-end processes (such as travel, delivery, etc.) through the core implementation class Notification.ProgressStyle, developers can implement richer notification capabilities.
Photo Picker Enhancements
The Photo Picker feature has received improvements that include Embedded Photo Picker and Cloud Search in Photo Picker.
Compatibility
Fitness and Health Permissions
The `BODY_SENSOR` permission will be migrated to the “Health Data Sharing” permission group. APIs previously accessed through `BODY_SENSOR` or `BODY_SENSORS_BACKGROUND` permissions will now require the corresponding `android.permissions.health` permission.
Deprecated and Disabled Elegant Fonts API
The elegantTextHeight attribute of TextView is set to true by default, replacing compact fonts with more readable fonts. You can override this setting by setting the elegantTextHeight attribute to false. The elegantTextHeight attribute is deprecated in Android 16, and the system will ignore this attribute once your application targets Android 16.
Adaptive layout
When the application upgrades to target SDK 36, it must adapt to full-screen display and both portrait and landscape orientations; the system will ignore fixed aspect ratio displays and fixed screen orientation displays.
Security and Privacy
Application’s Own Photos
When applications targeting SDK 36 or higher prompt users to grant photo and video permissions on devices running Android 16 or higher, if the user chooses to restrict access to selected media, they will see all the photos owned by that application in the photo picker. Users can deselect these preselected options, which will revoke the application’s access to those photos and videos.
Safer Intents
During intent processing, checks are added to filter out intents that do not meet specific conditions, protecting applications from malicious actions.
Key Sharing API
Android 16 introduces several APIs that support sharing access to Android Keystore keys with other applications. The new `KeyStoreManager` class allows granting and revoking access to keys by application UID and includes an API for applications to access shared keys.
Performance and Power Consumption
System-Triggered Performance Profiling
Android 16 introduces system-triggered performance profiling to the ProfilingManager. Applications can register their interest in receiving trajectories for specific triggers (such as cold start reportFullyDrawn or ANR), and the system will start and stop trajectories on behalf of the application. Once the trajectories are completed, the results will be sent to the application’s data directory.
Headroom API in ADPF
The SystemHealthManager introduces getCpuHeadroom and getGpuHeadroom APIs, designed to provide estimates of available CPU and GPU resources for games and resource-intensive applications.
Known Issues
- Certain system applications and settings may encounter issues, such as crashes, abnormal icon display, etc.
- Message notifications display abnormally in certain scenarios.
- Multi-Screen Connect-related functions are abnormal in certain scenarios
- There are some compatibility issues with third-party apps.
Android 16 Beta 3 upgrade guide
- Download the Android 16 Beta upgrade zip package from the PC and copy it to the phone storage.
- Go to Settings -> About device -> Version -> Click Build number 7 times and enter the password, now you are in developer mode.
- Go back to Settings -> About device -> Click the top card->Click the top right button -> Local install -> Click on the corresponding installation package -> Extract.
- Click to install after the extraction is done.
- After the installation is done, click restart.
Please make sure the battery level is above 30% and a minimum of 4GB of storage space is available. Also make sure to backup your data before upgrading as Android 16 Beta will completely erase your device’s storage. The Version of OPPO Find X8 needs to be 15.0.0.506 and below when upgrading to Android 16 Beta 3
