LineageOS 20 based on Android 13 has arrived, bringing new features and a new default camera app

LineageOS 20 is here, based on Android 13, and it has lots of new features and, best of all, a new default camera app!

LineageOS is a recognized player in the field of custom Android development. It succeeded CyanogenMod and now supports a large number of devices, giving enthusiasts a way to customize and optimize their systems without being bogged down by heavy skins. The LineageOS team recently released a major update, LineageOS 20, based on Android 13.

New Features in LineageOS 20

LineageOS 20 comes with many new features and improvements:

• Security patches from April 2022 to December 2022 have been merged with LineageOS 17.1 to 20.
• LineageOS now has a new camera app called Aperture! It’s based on Google’s impressive CameraX library (mostly) and offers a much closer to stock camera app experience on many devices. Huge congratulations to developers SebaUbuntu, LuK1337 and luca020400 who originally developed it, designer Vazguard, and the whole team for working to integrate it into LineageOS and adapt it to our wide range of supported devices!
• WebView has been updated to Chromium 108.0.5359.79.
• Volume panel completely redone in Android 13 and development of the side expansion panel.
• Full support for Generic Kernel Image and Linux 5.10 builds with full support for off-tree modules to match new AOSP conventions.
• The Lineage fork of the AOSP Gallery app has seen many fixes and improvements.
• The Updater app has seen many bug fixes and improvements, along with a fancy new Android TV layout
• Our web browser, Jelly has seen several bug fixes and improvements
• More upstream changes and improvements to the FOSS Etar calendar app they integrated a while ago
• More upstream changes and improvements to the Seedvault backup app.
• The Recorder app has been adapted to accommodate Android’s built-in functionality, while still providing the features you expect from LineageOS.
  • The app has been heavily redesigned.
  • The hardware you support has been added.
  • The high quality recorder (WAV format) now supports stereo, and there have been several thread fixes.
• Android TV builds now come with an ad-free Android TV launcher, unlike Google’s ad-enabled launcher – it also supports Google TV-style builds, and they’re considering switching to this one on Android TV releases. supported devices in the future.
• Several features of Google TV, such as the much more attractive two-panel settings app, have been ported to LineageOS Android TV builds.
• adb_root service is no longer tied to the build type property, allowing greater compatibility with many third-party root systems.
• The merge scripts have been extensively overhauled, greatly simplifying the Android Security Bulletin merge process, as well as streamlining supported devices such as Pixel devices that have full source builds.
• LLVM has been fully adopted, with releases now defaulting to LLVM bin-utils and, optionally, the LLVM built-in assembler. For those of you with older kernels, don’t worry, you can always unsubscribe.
• A global quick settings lighting mode has been developed so that this UI element matches the theme of the device.
• The setup wizard has been adapted for Android 13, with a new look and smoother transitions/user experience.

LineageOS 20 Aperture, a new default camera app

If you’ve ever used the default camera app on LineageOS, you might have been disappointed. “Snap”, the app’s name, was a fork of Qualcomm’s own camera app, and they eventually settled on the default AOSP camera app. It used the Camera2 API, which is just too simplistic for most people. This is why Aperture is so important.

Aperture uses the CameraX API, which has matured in recent years to become usable for an entire camera app. Aperture is able to implement the following features with it:

• Auxiliary camera support (device maintainers need to enable)
• Video frame rate controls
• Full control of EIS (electronic image stabilization) and OIS (optical image stabilization) settings
• A leveler to check the orientation angle of the device

LineageOS 20 build list

The following is the official build list for the initial batch of the LineageOS 20 rollout, and if you have one of these devices, you’ll soon be able to install LineageOS 20.

Generic targets

Just like the last two releases, the LineageOS team supports the Android Virtual Device (AVD), i.e. the default emulation environment provided by Android Studio, as a build target. LineageOS 19 also added support for Android Automotive build targets. Developers can also create Generic System Image (GSI) packages in mobile and Android TV configurations, although the official download portal does not host such precompiled versions. Indeed, it depends on how well an OEM has complied (or not) with Treble’s requirements to operate.

What if my device is not listed here?

Just because your device isn’t listed here doesn’t mean you won’t be able to enjoy LineageOS 20 just yet. Due to its open source nature, there are a number of unofficial builds for many devices on our forums, many of which will eventually become official builds as development progresses. Plus: most of them are, now, perfectly stable as daily drivers, with the occasional little quirk.

How to Upgrade to LineageOS 20 from an Earlier Version

If you are unfamiliar with the process of installing custom ROMs or modifying your phone, you must first unlock your device’s bootloader and install an updated custom recovery, such as LineageOS Recovery or TWRP before trying to do anything. Then, once the official builds of LineageOS 20 are available for your device, you’ll need to install them through this custom recovery environment. Device-specific instructions may vary, so check the wiki for your device first.

As for Google apps, they are not pre-installed on any version of LineageOS. You need to choose an appropriate GApps distribution and install it yourself.

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Source: LineageOS Blog