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Developer brings Android 12L to Raspberry Pi 4 w/ custom ROM

As if bringing Android 12L to the nine-year-old Nexus 7 was not enough, a developer has ported the latest mobile OS build to the Raspberry Pi 4.

Already one of the homebrew computing champions, the Raspberry Pi has been the backbone of many home automation projects, media servers, and is the perfect emulation station for classic games. However, it’s not often that Raspberry Pi owners opt to go down the Android route. Developer KonstaT has been responsible for porting Android to previous models and their latest effort now shoehorns Android 12L to the Raspberry Pi 4 Model B (via XDA).

As you would expect, this port is not perfect in the traditional sense. There are a number of bugs related to video decoding and many of the official Raspberry Pi camera accessories don’t work as they should. This includes the add-on camera modules plus the built-in camcorder.

This Android 12L build for the Raspberry Pi is based upon LineageOS 19.1 and includes the latest March 2022 security patch. A major bonus here is that this build is also compatible with the Raspberry Pi 400, which is a mini ARM-based PC that is all contained within a mini keyboard form factor.

Android 12L on the Raspberry Pi is not the only feat here, as the dev has also ported Android TV 12 to the tiny ARM-powered PCs. While we applaud the efforts, we’re not sure how much utility even the most ardent Raspberry Pi homebrewers will find from running Android on such a form factor. That said, you can boot this ROM from a microSD card, which makes trying this out for yourself a little less destructive to any compatible Pi system you’ve built. If you fancy a few hours of fun you can check out the full installation guide right here.

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Avatar for Damien Wilde Damien Wilde

Damien is a UK-based video producer for 9to5Google. Find him on Twitter: @iamdamienwilde. Email: damien@9to5mac.com