Google officially announced that the tech firm will end its support to all Android Market on devices running Android 2.1 Eclair or below. This announcement of shutting down will start at the end of this month. Along with this, Google will also bring an end to the app store that users of Android 2.1 or older probably hasn't thought about in years.
It is very hard to imagine that many people are still using mobile phones running the Android 2.1 Eclair and older. For the record, that kind of Android operating system would have been found on devices circa 2000 or 2010. The phones have a small amount and low-resolution displays, low battery capacity, slow networks, and limited usable apps. More often than not, the existing cheapest smartphones of today are still miles ahead of an old handset running Android Eclair.
According to SlashGear, Google has still up to this point managed the Android Market for these old phones despite the passed seven long years. In fact, the version of the app store that is carried on the old mobile devices is said to be the pre-Google Play. And once June 30 rolls around, these old things won’t be able to access the Android Market anymore. Google already confirms that there won’t be any notification or announcement about the change sent to all the devices affected by this shutdown.
The absence of an on-device notification is because of the "technical restrictions" that exist on the Android Market application. All users of a smartphone running Android 2.2 or newer than that can use the Google Play Store instead. However, the search giant also says that it will still be supporting and carrying later versions of Android Market for as long as possible.
While this is one of the unfortunate news nowadays and may prove to be inconvenient for some users, it’s worth pointing out that Google Android 2.2 Froyo and below don’t even show up on regularly distribution charts anymore. According to Android Authority, Android 2.3 Gingerbread is nearing a comparable fate. Meaning, users of mobile devices running the Android Gingerbread should be ready anytime soon.
In addition to the unfavorable news, most app developers have also decided stop supporting Android 1.0 through Android 2.1. This means that even if a user has an old device running one of the said versions of Google’s OS, Google’s settlement to end support for Android Market shouldn’t make any difference in real-life.
