Google has announced that it will end its support for its Chrome browser on a few older Android devices in the coming weeks. The ad has been made via a Google assistance page which indicates that Chrome will now need Android 10 or more, which means that older Android versions like Android 8.0 (Oreo) and Android 9.0 (PIE) will not obtain the support of early August of this year.
The new support strategy will start in the first week of August with the release of the Chrome 139 update on Android. The good news, however, for former Android users is that even if Google Chrome will no longer serve new updates, the old version of the browser will continue to remain operational.
While the navigator would stop working at some point in the future, this date is still months, even years.
In an assistance page on new changes, Google said: “Chrome 138 is the latest version of Chrome that will support Android 8.0 (Oreo) and Android 9.0 (PIE). Chrome 139 (temporarily planned for the release on August 5, 2025) is the first version of Chrome which requires Android 10.0 or later.
“The older versions of Chrome will continue to operate, but there will be no other updates published for users on these operating systems. If you are currently on Android 8.0 or Android 9.0, we encourage you to go to an Android 10.0 version (or more recent) to make sure you continue to receive the latest safety updates and chrome features. ”
According to Android distribution numbers until April 2025, Android 9 is currently operating on 6% of Android devices while Android 8 and Android 8.1 operate on approximately 4% of devices. While 10% are still a lot of people to leave, these Android versions have already executed the end of their cycle. For example, Android 8 was published for the first time in 2017 while Android 9 was released in 2018, marking 8 and 7 years since the first time these versions were published.
