Home windows 11 to lose official help for Android apps
It was just a few years in the past — in 2021 — that Home windows 11 gained official help for Android apps due to a Microsoft-maintained VM referred to as the Home windows Subsystem for Android (WSA). With the WSA, Home windows 11 customers might set up and run practically the total vary of apps for Android, optionally by way of Amazon’s Android market — the Amazon Appstore — due to an Amazon-Microsoft deal.
Now Home windows 11 is dropping official Android app help — and entry to the Amazon Appstore together with it.
Microsoft at present announced that it plans to cease sustaining the WSA inside the 12 months. Home windows 11 customers who’ve put in the Amazon Appstore or Android apps will proceed to have entry to these apps by way of March 5, 2025 — however not after. And beginning tomorrow, Amazon plans to stop new customers from downloading the Amazon Appstore from the Microsoft Retailer, Microsoft’s app retailer for Home windows.
Picture Credit: Microsoft
“Prospects might proceed utilizing Amazon Appstore apps that they beforehand put in and can nonetheless be capable to obtain app updates [after March 6],” Amazon wrote in a weblog put up published at present. “Builders will not be capable to submit internet new apps concentrating on Home windows 11 after March 5, 2024, however builders with an current app can proceed to submit app updates till Amazon Appstore on Home windows 11 is totally discontinued.”
As Ars Technica’s Andrew Cunningham notes, the WSA, whereas a handy technique to run Android apps on Home windows, was restricted from the beginning due to its lack of ability to entry the Google Play Retailer, the official Android app retailer — no less than not with out workarounds. The Amazon Appstore had a smaller choice, probably driving customers in lots of instances to native Home windows or web-based variations of apps they may’ve put in by way of the WSA.
In different phrases, WSA utilization was most likely fairly low — at a time when Microsoft’s consideration could be very clearly elsewhere, akin to on generative AI and its numerous incarnations in Home windows.
Now, simply because Microsoft is ending help for the WSA doesn’t imply it’ll grow to be not possible to run Android apps on Home windows. Quite a few third-party options exist, together with Waydroid, which gives help for Android apps through Linux-based system containers, and BlueStacks, an Android emulator for Home windows and macOS.
And Microsoft’s dedication to bridging the hole between Android and Home windows gadgets doesn’t look like wavering.
Simply this week, Microsoft launched a characteristic that permits Android customers to make use of their system’s digital camera as a webcam on Home windows 11. Elsewhere, Microsoft maintains apps like Hyperlink to Home windows, which lets Android (and iOS) customers make and take calls, reply to texts and examine and dismiss notifications from a Home windows PC.