Developers are porting Android to the Nintendo Switch – Liliputing

The Nintendo Switch is a versatile game console that you can plug into a TV or use as a handheld game system. Under the hood it’s got the kind of guts you’d find in a pretty good Android tablet, but it ships with Nintendo’s custom software instead.

Last year hackers figured out how to jailbreak the Switch and get it to run GNU/Linux-based software. Now two developers are working to port Android to the device.

It’s still a work in progress and a lot of things don’t work yet. But it does look like it’s possible to run a buggy version of Android Q on the Nintendo Switch.

Developers Max Keller and Billy Laws are behind the port, and as of February 24th, 2019 it looks like they’ve got the operating system booting and WiFi and Bluetooth are fully supported.

But there’s still a long list of features that aren’t yet working properly, including:

• GPU drivers
• USB
• Audio
• Nintendo’s Joy-Con controllers “work, but need tweaking.”
• The display “has a funky color scheme” related to the lack of working GPU drivers.

But Keller does note that there may be a partial solution to at least one issue in the works: he says Bluetooth audio “should be doable soon.”

There are certainly cheaper ways to get your hands on an Android tablet than to turn a Switch into one. But if you’ve already got a Switch, it’s kind of nifty to know that not only can it already run Linux, but soon you may be able to install Android on it to turn it into a more full-featured mobile computing device.

You could also probably pick up some of the same games available for the Switch at lower prices… if the developers manage to resolve the GPU issues.

( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) #NintendoSwitch #Android pic.twitter.com/RfbN7VKStw

— Max Keller (@langer_hans) February 23, 2019

via Engadget and Wololo