Targeting Android Platforms

Android platform is a fancy way of saying Android version. At this writing, many versions of Android are available, ranging up through version 4.1. You can target any platform you choose.

Several versions of Android are still widely used on phones. If you want to reach the largest number of users, target an earlier version. If your app requires functionality that older platforms can’t support, however, by all means target the newer platform. It would make no sense to write a Bluetooth toggle widget targeting any platform earlier than 2.0 because earlier platforms can’t use Bluetooth.

Figure 2-17 shows the percentage of each platform in use as of May 2012. To view current platform statistics, visit http://developer.android.com/resources/dashboard/platform-versions.html .