103
Google confirms 'high-friction' sideloading flow is coming to Android
(www.androidauthority.com)
this post was submitted on 25 Jan 2026
103 points (98.1% liked)
Android
1040 readers
1 users here now
Android news for android developers. Everything that happens in android world.
For Android development specific topics please see /c/android_dev
The Android robot is reproduced or modified from work created and shared by Google and used according to terms described in the Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution License
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
It's called installing, not sideloading.
You don't sideload an app on your PC, you install it. The language they're using is specifically to demonize a normal function of a phone, so they can take control.
You don't "sideload" an app on your PC, YET. They would very much like to limit your use of your own PC too.
Microsoft has to get money from its Windows monopoly somehow.
You basically do already. Most cheaper PCs come with S mode enabled from the store. Turning it off requires accepting a scary disclaimer that it's a permanent change and you're likely to fuck up your computer.
I have to be honest though, I kinda like it for older relatives that I can't convince to switch to Linux. Prevents tech support calls to me. And if Android was setup the same way with a one time prompt, I'd be perfectly happy.
Sideloading is just a normal term for a specific kind of installing, different than the default method of using the preinstalled store app. Practically nobody actually installs applications on phones from outside those stores. It's a useful and meaningful distinction, and much shorter than saying "installing apps by means other than official stores". You don't "sideload" an app on your PC because that distinction is useless, as it's the default approach anyway.
In fact, the term itself has existed since like the 90s, and has just been adopted for use with smartphones.
for transfering files to your companion devices from a device where you downloaded the files down to.
Installing an APK is not sideloading, as you can download the APK directly on your Android enabled Device. Is your Android Smartphone a companion device?
The guardian project, f-droid, aurora store, etc etc would disagree with your statement that nobody installs outside of the playstore. GrapheneOS, /E/OS etc don't even have playstore as a default store, you choose to install the playstore if you want Google in your life
I didn’t say “nobody”, I said “practically nobody”, and that’s exactly the amount of users of those OSes/stores. Out of ≈7B smartphone users, even being giga-generous, maybe ≈1M use them (realistically, it's a fraction of that). That’s ≈0.014%, about the same ratio of people getting struck by lightning annually, or, you know, practically nobody.
Source for the number of users@ also aurora is a replacement store, google would still call it sideloading to scare users even if the install mechanism is store based
There's no "default" way to install Sherlock Holmes, installing is a "what" not a "how"