Android 15 is the next major iteration in the Android industry, which is expected to revamp the lock screen and notifications panel to look better in landscape mode on smartphones.
Transparently, Android’s user interface works decently on both smartphones and tablets but is optimized for their typical alignments, for instance, portrait on smartphones and landscape on tablets. Somehow this causes issues while using the device in the opposite mode, with elements such as a lock screen and notifications not displaying competently.
However, the forthcoming Android 15 update assures an improved landscape layout facility for both the lock screen and notification panel on phones. The present lock screen on Android 14 smartphones does not have a landscape mode at all. Noticeably, the notification panel does exist in landscape mode, but the fact is, it’s not ideal. A lot of wasted space appears; for instance, notifications only fill half the width, and crucial elements such as the brightness slider and user switcher are hidden until you swipe down again.
On the opposite side, the reports reveal that the newer notification panel layout that is manually enabled in Android 15 leaves enough space to show your notifications. The detailed arrangement is mentioned below:
- Four of your Quick Settings tiles (in a 2×2 layout), the brightness slider, and the rest of the previously mentioned elements.
The new landscape mode layout for the phone’s lock screens appears similar to the one for tablets. Initially, the landscape-optimized UI for the lock screen in Android 14 QPR1 Beta 1 was released in September, and then the landscape-optimized UI for the notification panel in Android 14 QPR2 Beta 2 was released in December.
It is expected that Google will bring these new landscape-optimized layouts for the lock screen and notifications panel, which are clear improvements from the current baseline.
