Android 15 Might Bring a Less Awkward Landscape UI to Phones

TL;DR: Android 15 may bring tablet-inspired landscape optimizations to phones, including a redesigned Quick Settings panel and lock screen, improving the user experience in landscape orientation.

Android 15 could apply some tablet-inspired optimizations to certain UI elements on phones used in landscape orientation. Writing for Android Authority, certified Android whiz Mishaal Rahman reports that the Quick Settings panel and lock screen on phones running Android 15 may be reorganized to make better use of the wide canvas afforded when the device is in the landscape, squeezing more info into the same area with less wasted space.

On phones running Android 14, accessing the Quick Settings panel while the phone is held in landscape orientation shows a menu that more or less looks the same as the standard portrait-orientation layout, but awkwardly stretched to fill more horizontal space, showing a sliver of Quick Settings tiles at the top, over one or two app notifications. On Android 14-based tablets, the Quick Settings panel is organized in a sort of side-by-side layout, with Quick Settings on the left and notifications on the right.

According to Rahman, a Quick Settings interface like the existing one for tablets is also in the works for phones and could ship with Android 15 this fall. Rahman notes that the implementation as it exists now is unfinished and buggy, however.

It’s a welcome change.

A Landscape Lock Screen, Too

Rahman also reports that a new landscape lock screen interface he first saw poking around last year’s Android 14 QPR1 Beta 1 release could also make its way to phones running Android 15. In stock Android 14, the lock screen and unlock controls are only ever displayed in portrait orientation — they don’t have a landscape orientation at all. In Android 15, however, they’ll reorient to fit a landscape display right along with the rest of the UI. The resulting interfaces also look a lot like what you’ll find on tablets running stock (or Pixel-flavored) Android 14.

And the accompanying landscape unlock interface.

A Niche Feature, But Improvement is Improvement

A landscape-orientation lock screen seems like something you wouldn’t often see on a phone, but it could make the Android experience nicer around the margins — for example, if you have your phone perched in a car mount in that position, or if you’ve got a clip-on game controller attached.

Every little bit helps.