LineageOS 18.1 upgrades to Android 11, coming to Pixel 5, 4a, OnePlus 8, more

Official builds of LineageOS version 18.1, the Android 11 based update to the ever-popular third-party ROM, are becoming available for the Pixel 5, Pixel 4a 5G, Pixel 4a, and OnePlus 8 series.

While Google’s phones have some of the longest life spans in the Android world — though the crown now belongs to Samsung — third-party ROMs like LineageOS can offer support well beyond the manufacturer’s end-of-support date. Another core benefit of LineageOS is a highly customizable experience that tries to stay close to the feeling of “pure” Android/AOSP.

LineageOS maintains a list of devices that they officially support, and this list was updated today to include seven new Android phones from Google, OnePlus, and Xiaomi.

• Google Pixel 4a
• Google Pixel 4a 5G
• Google Pixel 5
• OnePlus 8
• OnePlus 8 Pro
• OnePlus 8T
• Xiaomi Mi 8 Lite

Notably, all of these devices are marked in the official wiki as supporting version 18.1 of LineageOS, not the previous 17.1 branch that was based on Android 10. Digging a bit deeper, it seems that the arrival of these phones heralds the first releases of LineageOS 18.1.

Update: LineageOS 18.1 has now been announced on the ROM’s official blog, where the developers shared the progress they’ve made over the past year, including a variety of new features!

• Security patches from April 2020 to March 2021 have been merged to LineageOS 15.1 through 18.1.
  • 18.1 builds are currently based on the android-11.0.0_r32 tag, which is the Pixel series unified tag.
• Wi-Fi display is available for newer Qualcomm devices, on a device-by-device basis.
• WebView has been updated to Chromium 89.0.4389.105.
• Our Recorder app has been vastly improved in more ways than can be counted, go leave yourself a voice-memo so you don’t forget that great idea!
  • Screen recording has been moved to a QS tile to match AOSP’s behavior.
  • The user interface has been revamped and there’s also now a UI for easily viewing, managing, and sharing your voice notes.
  • It’s now possible to choose the quality of your audio recordings to save space.
  • It’s now possible to pause and resume recordings.
• The FOSS Etar app has been forked, improved, and shipped in place of the stagnant and largely unmaintained AOSP calendar.
• The Calyx institute’s FOSS Seedvault application has been included as a built-in backup solution.
  • To use it, navigate to Settings -> System -> Backup, and “Change backup provider” to Seedvault. You can then click “Seedvault Backup” to configure, schedule, and encrypt backups!
  • Backups created with Seedvault can be uploaded on your Nextcloud instance, an external USB drive or kept on your local storage.
• There is now an option on non-A/B devices to update the recovery image alongside the OS, just as the stock OS would!
  • To use this, either enable the option during the initial device setup or navigate to Settings -> System -> (Show More) Updater -> Three Dot Menu in the top right -> and check “Update recovery alongside OS”.
• Our music app, Eleven now has a more up-to-date UI and integrates nicely with all the new android features for music players such as seeking from the notification.
• All LineageOS apps now have support for dark mode.
• (17.1 too) Our recovery now has a new, colorful, and fun UI that is much more accessible.
• (17.1 too) The firewall can block all connections now by making apps think that the device is in airplane mode.
• (17.1 too) We’ve introduced a new expandable volume dialog UI that allows you to control multiple volume streams more easily.
• (17.1 too) The partial screenshot feature has been improved with a new UI that’s easier to use. On 18.1 it also integrates nicely with the new Android’s “instant screenshot”. Long press the screenshot button in the power menu and give it a try!
• (17.1 too) Trebuchet now supports icon packs.
• (17.1 too) ADB root was reworked to ensure compatibility with other 3rd party root solutions.

It’s not just those seven devices that are getting LineageOS 18.1, as a whopping 63 previously supported devices are poised to gain the Android 11-based version of the ROM. Per the code, these builds are set to be done on a “weekly” basis, meaning it will still be a few days before the first official releases of LineageOS 18.1 are available for download for your favorite Android phone. To check whether or not a release of LineageOS 18.1 is available for your phone, find it in the official list of devices, click through, and find the “Get the builds here” link.

Here’s the full list of devices currently getting upgraded from LineageOS 17.1 to 18.1: