Hello everyone and welcome to the channel and here is my second video about QPR1 beta 2 on my Pixel 8 Pro. I keep spotting new features that are worth mentioning. So without further ado, let's jump in. Let's start with the animations as I spotted some new changes here and there. And let's start with the unlocking animation. Let's say you are using the new frames feature. When you unlock the phone, you get this really cool animation which is not new. But what's new here, if you have an app open on the phone and then you try to unlock it, you will see the home screen animation taking place before showing the app screen. As you see, it's like a shaded animation overlaying on top of the app currently open and then it disappears as shown in this video.
And here's one final look. The second one is the updated widgets animation. Look what happens when I tap on the clock widget. As you see, the widget itself will expand to cover the entire display and then it will transition to the app itself. And for reference, here is how the old animation on the stable version of Android 16 looks. As you see the difference between the two, this one will expand the widget itself while this one will jump to the app right away. Maybe it looks a little bit broken for now, but it seems like Google is updating this animation. And let me also show you the Google Home widget. As you see, the widget itself expands and then goes to the app, which is not the case here. The third one is the updated Gemini trigger animation. When you press and hold on the power button, as you see, the display shrinks and then the bar slides from the bottom. And the same applies to whatever screen you are on, even if you are inside an app. But keep in mind when I use the magic word Google, we get the same old animation.
The fourth one is the updated cinematic wallpaper animation. So take a look here at the difference when I activate the switch on both. You will see here that we have some sparkles here in the stable version while now we have just an overlay. And this is the difference between the two. And the last change in this category is the ability to close apps much faster in QPR1 beta 2 from the recent apps screen. So as an example, as you see when I swipe multiple apps back to back like this, it doesn't allow me to do so. But now when I do the same, as you see, apps are just flying on the screen. There is also one more change that I don't think I ever mentioned before, and I'm not sure if it's related to beta 2 specifically or not, but now when you tap and hold on the notification, you get a redesigned settings card.
Plus, it has the same bouncy animation when you switch between things as you see here. And when you tap on any of the buttons, as you see, the animation is a little bit different now. So, that's it when it comes to the animations. But before jumping to the next chapter, let me tell you that if you like any of the wallpapers you see in this video or any of my previous videos, they are now available in the wallpapers by in-depth tech reviews app. And here are the latest additions. And as you saw, the new wallpapers work great with the effects feature of Android 16 because now you can download these wallpapers locally on device. So for example, when you open the wallpaper and then tap on set or download, it will give you the download option over here.
Plus now you can also apply some edits on the wallpaper before downloading if you want to. So I can change the colors, the saturation, brightness, and add some blur effect. And once I'm done with all the edits, I can simply download the edited wallpaper or the stock one. And you will find Google Play Store download link in the description. And now let's get back to QPR1 beta 2. Now let me show you some random tweaks here and there. And the first one is the repositioned Wi-Fi and cellular data indicators. They now swapped places. And for reference, here are the same indicators on the stable version of Android 16. The second change is related to the lock screen. When you go to settings and then notifications and then notifications on lock screen, when you choose the compact view and then go back to the lock screen, you'll notice here that the pill is now transparent unlike before. Another visual tweak to the at a glance widget is the weather icons. As you see, they are now flat and simple, unlike the 3D icons we have in the stable version. And the same applies to the lock screen.
And with QPR beta 2, the date and weather are back again to show under the clock instead of next to it like in beta 1, which matches the stable version of Android 16. And with this build, Google did finally fix the battery widget issue when you activate the monochrome color palette. As you see, the battery percentage is still visible, which is not the case with the stable version of Android 16. the text is white on a white background. So you don't see your battery percentage, which is now fixed.
Another change is related to the phone calls chip. For example, when you start a phone call and then go back to the home screen, when you tap on the chip here at the top left corner, it no longer takes you to the call screen, but it will expand the floating banner so you can take quick actions like hang up, speaker, or mute. And this is how it looks.
There is also a new haptic feedback. When you try to change the wallpaper from the home screen overlay menu, when you tap on any of the available options, you get a small haptic feedback once you tap on the thumbnail. So, these are all the hidden features I spotted after using this build for a while. Please let me know in the comments if I missed anything..
