With the introduction of the Windows Subsystem for Android, Microsoft has allured many of its fans by supporting Android apps in Windows 11.
But, this support so far has been soft since the Android apps running in Windows 11 aren’t performing as well as emulators. Thus, Microsoft in its latest update to WSA brought H.264 decoding for addressing this. Further, there’s a Mail app integration and a few other features included in this update.
New Update to Win11 WSA
To make Windows OS competitive and more productive, Microsoft announced support for running Android apps on its Windows platform. And this was made available to all eligible users in November last year, through Windows Subsystem for Android (WSA).
This is in turn based on Windows Subsystem for Linux, which also lets users run Linux commands in Windows OS. With WSA, Microsoft opened doors to let all Android apps from Amazon’s App Store and even sideload apk files from external sources like GitHub.
While it’s working anyway, it’s just not offering the performance as expected! Microsoft noted complaints from many users that Android apps’ performance in Windows 11 through WSA isn’t good as third-party emulators even! Thus, Microsoft is now addressing this issue with an update (v2203.40000.1.0) to WSA.
In this version, Microsoft added H.264 decoding support, letting Android apps benefit from high-end hardware to perform better. Apps like WhatsApp and even Play Store should see responding quicker, and better. Also, the addition of H.264 decoding helps users watch HD videos smoothly and with minimal shuttering.
Besides this, there’s a Mail app integration in this update, which lets users open any mail link from the Android app in their native Windows 11 Mail app. Further, there’s an integration of MSAA to improve the performance of games like PUBG: Mobile.
