New to me... and using alt app source is risky and you are warned about it

Does it mean that it will no longer be possible to publish on the Play Store without all this registration and identification?
Or does it also mean that the option to install a APK manually will be taken away?
What about Developer mode?

Basically, are the additional restrictions only on the publisher's side, or also end-user's side?
If end-user - is this "certified Android device" an optional thing or mandatory? Is open-source Android going away?

First part, definitely.

Second, at least so far, certified device was usually the one that didn't have its bootloader unlocked. Though there are varying levels of integrity checks and only the most stringent one requires locked bootloader. Of course, the one with locked bootloader most easily passes all of those.

Reading what they have written certainly gives impression that at the very least the device in typical stock configuration will reject apps not sanctioned by Google.

It is important to understand what "typical stock configuration" means, and how easy it is to change it.

On any Android phone so far, I can enable Developer mode in a few clicks (this lets me further enable USB debugging and then you can do almost anything, albeit through rather complicated means). There is also a special permission to allow app install from non-default sources.

Which of these will be taken away, if any? If Developer Mode exists, and can be enabled easily, then I could even live with it being a requirement for APK sideload. In fact, it's probably better this way.

Otherwise, it will indeed become iOS's twin - where you have to first 'jailbreak' the phone to gain control over it. Seems stupid and undesirable.

i give up with phones some time ago

Never was much of interest, but i liked windows mobile back on time, and years later, even being very restrictive enjoy BB10

Never liked android, never. Feel slugish and bloat to me.even aosp

But at least wass usable, and i liked to customize, change roms etc

But at the end of day, i use the phone for WORK and FAMILY

And there ir a problem, called... WHATSAPP

Whatsapp never was nice, but since some time ago block and detect unlocked bootloaders and kick you out

end of story

Yes,some people, include myself success to bypass veryfications, but in a working emviroment this is not acceptable, i cannot lost contact with customers one day because whatsapp upgrade and found a way to block me again

and same with bank, goberment stuff etc

Even if android change to aclosed model are app the ones will fuck you before

Matth79 wrote on 2026-03-01, 21:34:

New to me... and using alt app source is risky and you are warned about it

F-droid is safer than the playstore.

Bleh. Doesn't really surprise me with the way the rest of the tech industry is going now.

I'm sure some future phone of mine will no longer run the relatively ancient Blokada 5 app (not from the Play store) that I have been using for several years, which blocks most ads in most apps. I hardly do anything on my phone, but when I am on it I do not want to deal with obnoxious advertising.

I help an elderly man with his devices and he has been bombarded with garbage on his phone (Samsung) over the past year because he has trouble discerning between things that are trying to manipulate him and things that he should actually interact with. It got so bad a couple months ago that his phone was just constantly spewing full screen, full-volume tiktok-like videos that were obviously designed to grab the attention of old people and brainwash them into buying things to "protect" themselves. I installed Blokada 5 on his phone and it has been silent ever since. He's not getting any ads, he isn't accidentally installing any malicious apps and he can now use his phone when he needs it without tapping on things that render it unusable.

What is absolutely ridiculous is that *I* had to enable the phone's ability to download apps from outside sources to get Blokada 5. All of the garbage he's been dealing with has come directly from Google Play. Of course, I switched this back off when I was done installing the app... but it's disgusting that such awful apps are promoted on the official store.

One can only hope that when this change happens, it will allow Google to control the malicious ad-filled garbage that plagues their store. But, I'm not going to hold my breath, considering where their money comes from.

I'm just glad I don't do much on my phone any more. From 2011 to 2022 I only used bootloader unlocked and\or rooted Android phones. My current one is locked and not rooted, and it has been okay that way because a lot of things that were locked down years ago have been made usable without root access... but also, I just don't do as much on it as I used to.

Honestly, it's amazing that in 2026 I can still install a device-wide ad blocker, a browser with it's own dedicated ad blocker and a version of Youtube that is mostly ad-free and removes tons of manipulative trash from the app. I guess that could all change by next year, but I will probably be keeping my phone for several more years.