18 ANDROID ADVISOR • ISSUE 50HANDS-ON
If you want to go nuclear though, do not disturb
has been updated. You can block them from appearing
when the screen is off if you don’t want the phone
buzzing away, or select block when on too, so that
only basic phone activity and status shows (time,
battery, alarm, and so on).
We quite like this. Phones are distracting, and
Google is trying to wean you off the stuff that doesn’t
matter. Delve further into the settings, and you can
customize hiding notifications from the ambient
display, disabling the blink light and other options.
It’s a welcome addition that has already made us
stop mindlessly picking up and unlocking our phone
because we know it won’t be displaying anything
until do not disturb is turned off.Adaptive features
Two new notable features on Android P are adaptive,
and they make a ton of sense working silently (but
optionally, of course) in the background.
Adaptive brightness auto adjusts your brightness
in unison with the light sensor as ever, but the slick
addition is that if you disagree with its choices, it’ll
learn your preferences as you manually adjust the
brightness yourself.
Adaptive battery is an evolution of Doze that
limits the battery consumption of apps that you
don’t use much. A prompt says your phone will ‘learn
how you use apps over time’ and echoes a similar
promise Huawei makes about its phones with a Kirin
970 processor. That this feature is now baked into
Android P is far more pleasing.