Tip
A news in Android is the ability to hide or protect individual apps on your mobile.
It can be useful if you share a mobile or tablet for example with your children, or if you have important company information on your mobile. If this sounds like a feature you already have, it is because several mobile manufacturers already have their own features in their user interface for private apps, but now it becomes a standard part of Android with Android 15.
The description below for private area is based on Pixel 9 Pro, but since Android is Android, there is always a chance that it works slightly differently on your manufacturer's mobile when they implemented Android 15.
The function is called private area (or sometimes private rooms), and you can find the feature under the security and confidentials settings, or by searching for private area in the app directory. You need to unlock with your screen lock (pin, fingerprints etc) to access the function.
When you configure your private area, you start by specifying which google account it should be used for. Here you can thus enter a google account other than what you are usually logged in to your mobile with, and if you do, no files, photos or email messages to that account will appear outside the private area. But you can also enter your regular google account.
Then set a lock to your private area. You can choose between using your regular screen lock (PIN, fingerprints etc) or to enter your own code for the private area. You can always unlock your private area with fingerprints, but you need to supplement it with either a pattern, a PIN or a password as an alternative unlock method. You will have to configure your fingerprint for the private room separately so you can if you want to use a finger different than what you normally unlock your phone with.
Finally, you install apps that you want to keep private in the area. Please note that when your private area is locked, you will not receive notifications from these apps and they are not run in the background. Thus, the private area is not suitable for apps that must be run in the background to work.
Once your private room is configured, you can scroll to the bottom of the app directory where you find your private area that you unlock with your fingerprint or code. When you do it, the app directory is extended and you see your private apps. From the beginning there is a bunch of Google's standard apps, such as camera, photo album and Chrome, and if you use them and have chosen a separate google account, the activity is not visible from them in your usual history. There is also Play Store, and you can download and install apps that then only end up in your private area.
There is also a private area setting button. There you can partly set when and how private area should be locked. The standard is that it is locked as soon as the lock screen is activated, but you can also set a time limit or that you have to lock it manually and it is only automatically locks if the phone restarts.
Also read
Android 15 security
You can also choose to hide your private area completely so that others do not know that you have it on your mobile. To open it, you must then search for private rooms in the search field for the app directory.
You cannot move your private area when you change mobile, but you have to configure it from the beginning again.
This is an excerpt from an article on news in Android previously published exclusively for Plus members at Mobil.se. Here you can become a plus member and thus have direct access to all articles on Mobil.se. As a plus member you get collected tips and many other in -depth, guiding articles. You can find the entire article here.