AOSP project is coming to an end
129 comments
·June 12, 2025transpute
terhechte
This is my biggest iPad gripe. I understand the security, but just make it a new "entitlement" that is only given to UTM, Parallels and VMWare fusion. Or make it a "developer mode" that you can only enable if you pay $99 a year. I'd be fine with that, but the whole iPad is unusable for any kind of software development and I'd love to be able to travel with just an iPad because for everything else I do while I'm traveling (watching videos, reading, browsing, writing, drawing) the iPad is great and I don't have to lug two devices around.
alerighi
It's not about security. Apple doesn't want to open on external applications, including the one run in VM/emulators, because it wants every software to pass from the AppStore. Not because security, but for the fee it has on app store purchases.
If it opens to having VM, you could just run another OS in a VM (Windows, for example) and install normal software on it (like the desktop version of most programs) and not pay the AppStore fee.
It's only a commercial reason, not a security one.
transpute
https://lapcatsoftware.com/articles/2025/6/1.html
> For more than 90 percent of the billings and sales facilitated by the App Store ecosystem, developers did not pay any commission to Apple.
Would the remaining 10 percent of App Store sales have meaningful competition from a CLI (no GUI) terminal VM that enables development workflows on iPad?
fc417fc802
If it was really about security (in the sense of that which benefits the end user) they'd just stick it behind a toggle and be done with it. I just think it's important to call out the misalignment - security can refer to the interests of the end user, or alternatively to the vendor. The ambiguity is convenient for PR statements.
misnome
We’ve decades of examples of simple toggles not working. Bad actors will just explain to the target the necessity of switching it on.
edude03
Can’t you already do that? If you pay 99/year you can sign your own apps with whatever entitlements no? You just can’t submit them to the Apple Store for obvious reasons
transpute
It was removed, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44255512
tacker2000
They will never allow this. They want to control and also cash in on the apps you use on these devices.
abandonliberty
Apple wants you to buy both... $100/year may make it worth it for them.
transpute
Apple customers have bought both, even multiples of each, would be willing to pay a hefty premium (e.g. bundle hypervisor entitlement with iPad Pros that have more memory) -- but Apple continues to refuse.
With the recent court ruling that enables non-Apple payment channels, blocking VMs does not protect revenue, but it does hurt Apple customers who want iPads for a quick portable terminal, while using their Macs for extended work sessions.
raffael_de
After years of being stuck with iPhones I'm also eager to soon switch back to Android. iOS always just felt like a polished compromise. Have been a happy customer of LOS using OnePlus devices. But LOS always also seemed a little opaque and casual. Hence I set my eyes on GrapheneOS and in consequence on a device from the Pixel lineup.
transpute
In an alternate universe, trade war and rare earth minerals shortage halts manufacturing of new iPhones, operating system updates become paid products and existing iPhones must implement the secure launch protocol that Asahi Linux uses on Apple Silicon, enabling AOSP for iPhones.
https://taoofmac.com/space/blog/2025/06/03/2155
> Apple has dropped the ball so badly that Sky is like a perfect storm of what they could have done, but didn’t. And now, not only is it a third-party app that is doing what Apple should have done, but it is also doing it in a better way that anything they ever shipped.
fsflover
> since Pixel is the only way to get Debian Linux ("Terminal") VM + desktop mode support
My Librem 5 also offers the desktop mode, since it just runs a desktop OS based on Debian (PureOS).
safety1st
Wait what? This is a screenshot of 9 short lines of text from the Reddit image server. What is actually going on? Android source is still Apache licensed right? How are these things becoming closed source? What is happening?
jampekka
Apache is not copyleft so new versions can become closed source.
safety1st
You're right, but I am seeing other random Reddit posts that say Google has simply changed their development workflow/branching strategy, and that the claim from the OP is inaccurate.
At the moment we have 200+ upvotes on something that is very light on information, but heavy on confusion. I am just trying to understand what is going on.
charcircuit
The copyright holder can change the license for new versions. Copyleft does not matter.
sebtron
As far as I understand this only concerns Google Pixel devices, and AOSP "coming to an end" is mostly speculation. Is this going to affect other manufacturers too, e.g. the Fairphone[1]?
subscribed
How does the firmware upgrade cycle looks like? Does their secure element securely throttle pin brute force? Does their hardware offer modern memory protection?
charcircuit
Fairphone should still be able to get the source for Android from Qualcomm.
hilbert42
How?
charcircuit
Looking at how it works for Wear OS. Qualcomm still only hosts the repos for the BSP and not the whole OS. It's expected to still get those from Google, from the partner portal.
xnx
Not true.
From the Android VPN and GM: "We're seeing some speculation that AOSP is being discontinued. To be clear, AOSP is NOT going away. AOSP was built on the foundation of being an open platform for device implementations, SoC vendors, and instruction set architectures.
AOSP needs a reference target that is flexible, configurable, and affordable – independent of any particular hardware, including those from Google. For years, developers have been building Cuttlefish (available on GitHub as the reference device for AOSP) and GSI targets from source. We continue to make those available for testing and development purposes."
belowaverageiq
Ready-made AOSP device trees for Pixels, which are needed to build custom ROMs, are the ones going away. This is a blow to GrapheneOS as they have been dedicating 100% of their time to improving their ROM itself in the past few years.
Since at this point they'll need to create device trees like LineageOS does with Snapdragon/MTK phones, so I hope they won't stick with the worst Android manufacturer on Earth. Especially now that the snapdragon 8 elite 2 will have the same security features as the Tensors.
belowaverageiq
Never mind, it seems like they're thinking of wasting their time with a custom ODM-built smartphone. I truly hope they won't choose this route. If they do someone should add "Will the GrapheneOS-Phone fail?" on Polymarket, I'll bet my parents' house on it.
xnx
> custom ODM-built smartphone
I agree that this would be a crazy choice and doomed to fail.
xnx
The Pixel device trees going away is very disappointing, but he headline "AOSP project is coming to an end" is an exaggeration.
DanAtC
Reading between the lines tells me they're discontinuing Pixel AOSP support which is a pretty big blow with zero warning to those who used them as de facto reference models.
ABS
FWIW: Google says Android Open Source Project not being ‘discontinued’ amidst Pixel change impacting custom ROMs
https://9to5google.com/2025/06/12/android-open-source-projec...
transpute
Pixel device trees and other code used to adapt the AOSP release to specific (Made by) Google hardware was not released in a big change from precedent. Without the Pixel hardware repos (which include the device trees, driver binaries, and more), custom Android ROMs will have a hard time developing their OS updates. This might also have implications for security (vulnerability) researchers.
SlowTao
While the title is jumping the gun a little, it is only a matter of time until I suspect this will be real. Give it maybe 5 years Max.
That said, first rule of predictions, don't provide a time frame.
bluebarbet
This is my take, too. I'm surprised by all the skepticism here, it looks to me like another case of techies not being able to see the wood for the trees.
These companies believe that AI puts them in an existential battle for survival. They're battening down the hatches. Concepts like open source and community collaboration can only look like unaffordable luxuries in such a context. Quaint, even.
IMO the last remaining hope for free software is going to be an entirely separate hardware-OS ecosystem, plus funding and lobbying to ensure that the web platform remains competitive.
prmoustache
Correct title would be: Google is locking Google Pixel platform.
bsimpson
Sounds more like "Google Pixel is no longer the reference device for AOSP"
surajrmal
Indeed. Also remember that android supports multiple form factors and pixel at best served as. reference only for phones. Auto, watches, and tablets were ill served. Cuttlefish, the replacement, works for all form factors.
bubblethink
I don't get the motivation behind this RedHatification. Hasn't Google already won in the Android space ? Nobody that matters is forking or using AOSP without Google's blessings anyway due to the stranglehold of Google Play Services. Why the sudden dick move ? I see some mention of the impending antitrust cases, but I don't quite see how that fits.
maxloh
> Nobody that matters is forking or using AOSP without Google's blessings anyway due to the stranglehold of Google Play Services.
What about Amazon's tablets?
rs186
Or every Android phone sold in China
bubblethink
But that's China. Google isn't playing in that sandbox at all. And all this is old news. Fire tablets have existed for more than a decade, Huawei phones w/o Play for more than half a decade.
pzo
sad, was thinking to switch from iPhone to pixel 10 in few months once released exactly for the reason that is clean android and gives and escape hatch to use grapheneOS or lineageOS or calysOS. Any other android phone manufacturer that is supported by any of those projects? Most devices supported except pixel devices are few years old.
flanbiscuit
I'm moving away from Pixel Phones for my next Android. Going to switch back to Samsung. I currently have a Pixel 8 and my screen went completely green and glitchy yesterday (Google "android green screen", it's a hardware issue). It freaked me out because Im in the beginning of a long vacation with tickets held digitally in various apps and email. Thankfully I eventually figured out the solution which is ridiculous, when it happens again I just need to squeeze the bottom of my phone. My last Pixel phone just completely died on me randomly as I unplugged it from my car. And I've had previous Pixel phones just ignore calls, sending them straight to voicemail (which is a common issue if you Google that as well).
I will miss having stock android and timely updates, I will hate Samsung bloatware and apps I can't uninstall, but it's I hope to have more stability and longer life for my phones. In barely getting 2 years of life from my Pixels. I'm also seriously considering iPhones as well.
bubblethink
You need to manage your expectations with Pixel devices. They are often on sale. Buy the A series for ~$300, which is also what the Nexus phones used to be priced at. They easily last 3+ years, and if they die after that it's no big deal. Dying early, bootlooping, overheating, etc. have been a part of these devices since they have existed.
lipowitz
They've raised the prices so one is looking at a 1 year old a-series to pay $300. Meanwhile they are even further behind the curve hardware wise.
It would be very nice (but a tremendous effort) if Graphene OS took this opportunity to switch hardware preference right before Google's August release. Maybe to someone who could make a modern tablet too.
ThatMedicIsASpy
I use my monitors, TVs, PC hardware for 10 years+. Things dying after 3 years is a big fucking deal. WTF is wrong with you.
alfiedotwtf
The worst but I’ve ever had with early Android was they never kept time properly! Set an alarm to wake you up, and when you eventually woke up, clock skew was out over an hour!
jhasse
The green screen issue is covered by warranty, so get your display swapped at an official repair store. The new ones don't have the green screen issue.
izacus
Why not return your phone for warranty when its obviously broken (hardware wise)?
jlokier
Fwiw, I've had a similar screen issue (turned green or magenta and glitchy, parts of the screen image disappearing, until one day it turned black) happen with two Samsung phones.
input_sh
> Most devices supported except pixel devices are few years old.
That pretty much sums it up, there's a reason all of those custom ROMs pivoted to supporting basically just Pixels. Apart from Pixels, your only options are Fairphone and a few years old Chinese models (Xiaomi, Motorola, OnePlus), none of which are even close to state-of-the-art hardware.
Custom ROMs are pretty much dead, this just might be the final nail in their coffin.
nixass
> (Xiaomi, Motorola, OnePlus), none of which are even close to state-of-the-art hardware.
Well, Pixel is arguably pretty shitty hardware as well
subscribed
Sadly it's also only reasonably secure Android phone :(
jacooper
I truly hate how crappy their processors are, it's insane that their upcoming flagship will have the same performance as a three year old flagship.
you don't need it, it's just a phone. Yeah maybe now, but in two years when the pixel is shitting itself you will understand.
If GrapheneOS dies, that's probably it for me with pixels. The only advantage left is how cheap you can get a new flagship pixel on the gray market.
belowaverageiq
this is not true at all. the 1yr old OP12 has LineageOS and so does the 6 months old 13R, with support for the 13 incoming.
pzo
I see only oneplus 11 in the officially supported phones list. I'm not interested in unofficial port - in the era of SGS2 I played many custom unofficial rooms but this days I don't have time for it
vbezhenar
I tried to switch from iPhone to Pixel and switched back. Modern Pixel is absolutely not clean android. It's a mess of misfeatures. There's no clean android. iPhone is lean and compact compared to Android. GrapheneOS is solid, but built by security freaks, so unless you're a fan of OpenBSD, it makes little sense to use it. And any custom ROM locks you out of many important apps, like banks apps, NFC payments, etc (unless you want to actively combat integrity system).
lipowitz
I don't see what OpenBSD has to do with it. Is this like liking reliability in a car meaning you are a Toyota fan?
I've had no trouble with banks, brokers or payment networks on GrapheneOS but I don't use crap like company-X pay wallets..
vbezhenar
GrapheneOS is not just AOSP rebuild. They do an astonishing amount of work to harden Android. They have a lot of security and privacy-related features. They built a custom layer over Google Services to contain them.
I admire this effort. However I don't care that much about my privacy and I don't care about extended security. All I want is a basic Android system without any of added apps, without any AI. I want the most basic apps for phone, SMS, camera. And I want working Google Play to install some additional apps. I want OS focused around this goal. Not OS focused around extended security or privacy.
So it's like suggesting to buy M1 Abrams instead of Toyota Land Cruiser.
I'm embracing ascetic computing. I'm using Arch Linux with bare minimum of apps for my desktop. And I wanted to do the same for my smartphone. Pixel is incredibly bloated. I spent few days just navigating its maze of settings, trying to disable them all. At this point, I'm back to my old iPhone, which at least allows me to uninstall almost every single app and old enough, so it does not support Apple Intelligence (thank, god).
NewJazz
Fairphone
zeech
GrapheneOS only supports Pixels due to their having superior security features [0]. Calyx supports Pixels as well as some newer Motos and the Fairphone 4 and 5 [1]. Lineage supports tons of devices [2].
LineageOS is the only one of the three that supports older hardware, but I'd recommend getting a previous-gen Pixel for the seven-year (at least) support cycle.
[0] https://grapheneos.org/faq#supported-devices
throawayonthe
grapheneos is still going strong
DaSHacka
Glad to hear, that was my immediate worry upon seeing the thread.
xbmcuser
Could be they don't want devices to have latest Android before their own latest flagship devices are released. They might release the AOSP in Aug when the new Pixel hardware drops.
VoidWhisperer
When you say that they dont want the latest android before their own flagship devices are released, do you mean people running AOSP before the new pixel releases with it or other phone manufacturers/carriers beating them to releasing it?
If the second one, that seems a bit unlikely. Atleast here, I don't think I've seen a carrier that delivers an updated android without taking a long time first - iirc this was part of the reason google made it possible to split out security updates and such, to kind of work around that
xbmcuser
I mean xda etc making AOSP roms before Google releases its new hardware
raffael_de
On a tangential:
I recently found out that using Kagi it is possible to configure RegEx replacements in the search results (this makes it possible to replace "[www.]reddit.com" with "old.reddit.com").
pwdisswordfishz
Unfortunately the old.reddit.com frontend does not support /s/ links.
raffael_de
I've no idea what that even is. For me old.reddit is about accessibility while using a VPN and 18+ content (comparison of vaporizers, for example).
I don't want to have an account there, as this just lures me into using it more and engaging in pointless discussions.
DidYaWipe
Can you even use the Play store on AOSP? I was interested in trying it (I don't use Android currently) but from what I gathered it seemed like a bit of a fraud (on Google's part) because it was fundamentally gimped.
onli
You can on ROMs like LineageOS. The Play Store is part of the Gapps package some users install during the installation of the system. Alternatively there is microG and the Aurora Store, so the play store itself isn't needed.
I assume that is the same situation on raw AOSP.
vachina
Some apps will delegate parts of itself to be downloaded from play store on demand. Meaning without play store, some apps literally won’t work because it will fail to launch the component needed to be downloaded from play store.
I’ve came across this in app when accessing some secure flows, like adding credit card numbers.
ohdeargodno
This only means that microG hasn't implemented the on demand feature download API for dynamic features.
alfiedotwtf
It’s been a while, but is LineageOS still going strong? I’ve been thinking of switching back to non-iPhones for a while
onli
I get the impression, yes. They still have a big list of supported devices, which means many maintainers, and they managed well to port their system to new android versions, even if a recent point release killed many devices. Have a look at https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/, or alternatively my ROM finder https://www.sustaphones.com/.
However, I personally switched to CalyxOS. I was a bit unhappy with LineageOS pushing users towards the Gapps, by blocking microG from working properly (they blocked signature spoofing, a problem during the pandemic) and by forbidding discussions about microG on their subreddit, together with forbidding to even talk about issues with VoLTE or anything that touches rooting the system. They course corrected only a little bit with the signature spoofing, but still project user hostility otherwise via those rules. CalyxOS gave me a more usable system out of the box, while having a bigger focus on security (locking the boot loader) and presenting the project nicer. Vastly less devices supported though, and if pixels go closed now the Calyx project would have to implement big changes, those were their main devices.
anonymousiam
At some point in the past you could. I used the Play Store with my Nexus One running cyanogenmodrom 15 years ago with no trouble. I haven't tried lately, but I'm planning to. Hopefully there aren't too many hoops to jump through to register an "unauthorized" device with Google.
Aachen
In the same way that manufacturers can add the store ("vending") and supporting APKs to the AOSP base they're building upon
charcircuit
AOSP does not include GMS or the Play Store.
>it seemed like a bit of a fraud (on Google's part) because it was fundamentally gimped.
AOSP is designed to be customized by vendors before they ship a device with it. Development of AOSP goes towards the shared OS pieces that actually get used and not towards things which would just get swapped out. Which is why the stock user space has not had much investment.
petabyt
Why do pixel device trees have to be updated through different Android versions? If so the differences would be minor, right?
Hopefully AOSP Pixel device support is merely delayed, not ended, since Pixel is the only way to get Debian Linux ("Terminal") VM + desktop mode support, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43973395.
With Apple's ongoing refusal to enable VM/JIT support on iOS and iPad, Google Pixel + GrapheneOS + Debian is a very competitive 2025 offering.