Earlier this week, popular Nintendo Switch emulators Citra and Yuzu announced they are shutting shop after the latter’s developers settled with the corporation for $2.4 billion, but it appears emulators of another kind are staring a resurgence in the face. Android emulators for Microsoft Windows could soon become popular again because the company just announced the shutdown of Windows Subsystem for Android, a module which allows users to run Android apps as native programs.
Microsoft started beta testing WSA in October 2021, touting it as a rival to Android emulators and conventional small-screen Android devices, but it was faced with two major challenges — incentivizing developers to optimize apps for keyboard and mouse inputs, and disturbing the Google Play Store app distribution monopoly on Android with a significantly smaller Amazon Appstore. Although WSA made it to Windows 11 release candidate builds in several markets starting in 2022, it remains unavailable to this day in many regions like India.
Now, it appears things will stay this way, because Microsoft has announced users won’t be allowed to look up the Amazon Appstore and other WSA utilities in the Microsoft Store on Windows 11. Support for apps, games, the Amazon Appstore, and existing WSA users is available until March 5, 2025 (via Mishaal Rahman) Users who have WSA up and running can continue using it, complete with tech support from Microsoft, until the cutoff date, but fresh installs aren’t possible anymore.
Fighting the lack of Play Store support with the Amazon Appstore was like bringing a knife to a gunfight, but we’re still hopeful nonetheless. Before Microsoft launched WSA for Windows in response to macOS supporting iOS apps, Windows users could pick from a thriving community of Android emulators such as BlueStacks and Android Studio. While a comeback for these programs is almost certain, Microsoft could pass the responsibility to the enthusiastic community of Windows users by making WSA fully open-source, and enabling convenient APK sideloading.
It might seem like a big ask considering Microsoft is more focused on Copilot AI than on WSA, but we just hope the company doesn’t earn a reputation for killing projects like Google with more shutdowns to fuel its AI focus later this year. The WSA shutdown is particularly sad because Microsoft is at the cusp of launching its own range of ARM-powered computing hardware and Android apps are optimized for the ARM architecture, unlike Windows programs designed for x86, which would need porting.
Thanks: Armando
Maybe if we start telling people the brain is an app they will start using it!
