Windows 11 spotted running Android apps – so support could be arriving soon

Windows 11 blemished running Android apps – so support could beryllium arriving soon

(Image credit: Microsoft)

Windows 11 doesn't boast Microsoft's promised native support for Android apps yet, as those penetrative to take up IT have doubtless noticed if they've adopted the new OS, but the upstanding news is that it looks like this much-awaited feature could be coming before too long.

Oregon leastwise we've caught a glance of Android apps now running under Windows 11 in testing, going away away a leak from Bilibili (China) As highlighted by Windows Latest.

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The theory is – and naturally, take this with some point of caution, as with any leak – that Microsoft is immediately testing the Android Subsystem for Windows 11, and that's exactly what these spilled screenshots (which admit a glimpse of WeChat) show.

If testing is underway internally, this indicates that pretty soon we can expect the feature to make its way to the on a regular basis released preview builds of Windows 11 (and subsequently on to the full version of Microsoft's OS).

It's a good sign, at any rate, and it's backed up by the fact that Amazon's App Store has been present in the Microsoft Store since about a calendar month agone (though it's not yet available for download, of course). Amazon's store is how Microsoft will deliver Humanoid apps in Windows 11 (rather than Google Play – and plain with the limitations therein, as not every app is carried aside Amazon River, by whatsoever means).

What's also interesting Here is that the spilled screen grabs show multiple Android apps unfastened in different Windows simultaneously, so multi-tasking testament be expedited here, as you might expect. Furthermore, any Android application will act like Windows software, in terms of being able-bodied to resize Windows then forth (and they'll work with the Telling Center too). The many unlined the consolidation, the better, naturally.

Analysis: An intoxicating glimpse, but there's still no official timeframe

Bear out for Android apps was something that was expected to introduction with the initial version of Windows 11, equally mentioned, but as soon as we started getting close to the put out of the new Bone, with no sign of the boast in test builds, it became clear adequate that it wasn't going to spend a penny the cut.

Since then, the question has become exactly how long are we going to undergo to wait for Android apps to grace the Windows 11 background? And at least sighted tangible evidence that testing is underway suggests that we might not induce all that recollective to go – at least until Android support hits the official Windows 11 preview builds. Testing is foreseen to outset before 2021 ends, of course, so we might just go through something happen in the next month on that frontal.

The road to release for the full rendering of Windows 11 could be a yearner and windier one and only, though, and we must remember that Microsoft has dropped to a metre of just one major feature update annually – thusly the next OS acclivity isn't coming until the second gear half of 2022. Because this is such a big feature, it may not lurch raised until then, only you ne'er know, there's always the theory of a sport pack update arriving in advance, earlier in 2022. We'll just rich person to date.

Meantime, Android apps can stillness be used with Microsoft's OS as long as you locomote through the Your Call app, simply that's a limited way of doing things, and hardly the same as having native backup built-in.

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Darren is a freelancer writing newsworthiness and features for TechRadar (and occasionally T3) across a broad range of computing topics including CPUs, GPUs, various other hardware, VPNs, antivirus and more. He has written about tech for the best part of threesome decades, and writes books in his spare time (his debut fresh - 'I Know What You Did Last Supper' - was published by Hachette UK in 2013).