Google is requiring Virtual A/B on new Android 11 devices, paving the way for mandatory Seamless Updates

With Android 7.0 Nougat, Google introduced a partition scheme designed to speed up software updates. In Nougat, Google added support for duplicating certain partitions so that inactive partitions can get updated in the background and then swapped to active with a quick reboot. This "A/B partition" setup allows for "seamless updates" to take place on supported Android devices, much like Google's Chrome OS. However, Google has never mandated the use of A/B partitions, so many devices out there that don't support seamless updates. That could change with Android 11, however, as Google is making it mandatory for newly launched devices to support virtual A/B partitions.

Anything to make the update situation on Android smoother is welcome.